Uniform with iJiis volume. 
OLD LANDMARKS 

AND 

Historic Fields of Middlesex. 

By SAMUEL ADAMS DRAKE. 
Illustrated. Price $2.00. 

Roberts Brothers, Publishers. 



OLD LANDMARKS 



OF 



BOSTON. 



Old Landmarks 



AND 



Historic Personages 



OF BOSTON. 



By SAMUEL ADAMS DRAKE. 



JIllustratEti. 





BOSTON: 

ROBERTS BROTHERS. 

1876. 



^73 

. 37 

.D77 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1872, 

BY JAMES R. OSGOOD & CO., 

in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 



FIFTH EDITION. 



Cambridge : 
Press-work by John Wdson 6^ Son. 



PREFACE. 



THE author has had a twofold object in presenting 
this work for the acceptance of the public. 

Besides the preservation of the old landmarks, now so 
rapidly disappearing before the era of improvement, there 
is a very general desire to know where the actors lived 
who have given Boston such prominence in the history 
of our country. 

The plan has been adopted, in viewing old localities, to 
tell for what they have been famous, and to briefly charac- 
terize or give some conspicuous traits and public services 
of the personages mentioned. 

In view of the limits prescribed for this volume it has 
been found necessary to condense from the abundant ma- 
terial in the author's possession, but it is believed the 
more important features have been given. 

While the numerous local publications have been care- 
fully examined, the author has in all cases preferred orig- 
inal authorities in the work of compilation, and has en- 
deavored to give credit wdiere it is due. The beaten track 
has been avoided as far as possible, and preference given 
to such topics as have either escaped mention altogether, 
or received but little notice from former writers. 

In a work so largely statistical it would be a surprise if 
errors did not exist, but unwearied pains have been taken 
to avoid them and to render the work as free from this 
objection as possible. 



VI PREFACE. 

The author believes that antiquarian subjects need not 
of necessity be either dry or uninteresting, and has aimed 
to make these pages agreeable to the general reader, — 
a class he is happy to say in which a growing interest 
in the early history of the founders of JSTew England is 
evident. 

Many persons have laid the author under obligations 
by the loan of documents or by communicating valuable 
information. He would express his deep sense of the 
favors and assistance rendered him by that eminent and 
thoroughly unselfish antiquarian, John Ward Dean, and 
also by Miss E. S. Quincy and John H. Dexter. Among 
the many persons consulted, who have kindly contributed 
in various ways to the success of this work, are Captain 
George H. Preble, U. S. K, Isaac Story, Lemuel Shaw, 
George Mountfort, William H. Montague, J. Win- 
gate Thornton, Eowland Ellis, and Timothy Dodd, 
Esqrs., the latter of whom, at the advanced age of ninety- 
three, retained a clear recollection of Boston as it 
existed three quarters of a century ago. 

Boston, Mass., October 22, 1872. 



CONTENTS 



INTRODUCTIOISr. 

Myles Standish. — William Blackstone. — Sliawmut. — Settlement by 
Winthrop's Company. — Trimountain. — Boston, — Physical Features. 

— Area. — Settlement by Indians. — Character of first Buildings. — 
First Location of the Settlers. — Geographical Divisions. — Wood and 
Water. — Dress. — Manners and Customs. — Slavery. — Curious old 
Laws. — Government of the Town. — Allotment of Lands. — Intoler- 
ance of the Times. — The Pulpit a Means of Intelligence. — Accounts 
by various Writers. — Town Records. — General Growth and Progi-ess. 

— Population. — Wards. — Paving the Streets. — Lighting the Streets. 

— Supply of Water. — Enlargement of Boston. — Commmiication with 
Mainland. — Ferries. — Bridges. — Coaches, Public and Private. — 
Railways 



CHAPTER I. 
king's chapel and the neighborhood. 

History of the Chapel. — Establishment of the Church of England. — 
Chapel Burial-Ground, — Boston Athenagura. — Academy of Arts and 
Sciences. — Historical Society. — The Museum. — Tlie Old Corner. — 
Royal Custom House. — Washington. — H. G. Otis. — Daniel Webster. 

— Tremont Street. — Howard Street. — Pemberton Hill. — Endicott. — 
Captain Southack. — Theodore Lyman, Senior. — John Cotton. — Sir 
Henry Vane. — Samuel Sewall. — Gardiner Greene. — Earl Percy. — 
Bellingham. — Faneuil. — Phillips. — Davenport. — Oxenbridge. — 
Beacon Street. — School Street. — Latin School. — Franklin Statue. 

— City Hall. — Otis. — Warren. — Mascarene. — Cromwell's Head. — 
The Old Corner Bookstore. — Anne Hutchinson. — Tlie French Church. 

— Catholic Church. — Second Universalist. — Province Street. — Chap- 
man Place. — James Lovell. — The Wendells 28 



VIU CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER II. 

FROM THE ORANGE-TREE TO THE OLD BRICK. 

Hanover Street. — General Warren. — The Orange-Tree. — Concert Hall. 

— Brattle Street. — Samuel Gore. — John Smibert. — Nathaniel Smi- 
bert. — Colonel Trumbull. — The Adelphi. — ScoUay's Buildings and 
Square. — Queen Street Writing School. — Master James Carter. — 
Cornhill. — Brattle Street Parsonage. — Old Prison. — Captain Kidd. 

— Court Houses. — Franklin Avenue. — Kneeland. — Franklin. — 
Edes and Gill. — Green and Russell. — First Book and Newspaper 
printed in Boston. — Rufus Choate. — Governor Leverett. — John A. 
Andrew. — Henry Dunster. — Town Pump. — Old Brick. — General 
Knox, — Count Rumford. — John Winslow 68 

CHAPTER III. 

FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON PIER. 

Captain Keayne. — Coggan, first Shopkeeper, — Old Cornhill. — Old 
State House. — First Church. — Stocks and Wliipping-Post. — John 
Wilson. — Wilson's Lane. — United States Bank. — Royal Exchange 
Tavern. — William Sheaffe. — Royal Custom House. — Exchange Cof- 
"fee House. — "Columbian Centinel." — Benjamin Russell. — Louis 
Philippe. — Louis Napoleon. — Congress Street. — Governors Dummer 
and Belcher. — First United States Custom House. — Post-Office. — 
Bunch of Grapes. — General Lincoln. — General Dearborn. — First 
Circulating Library. — British Coffee House. — Merchants' Row. — 
First Lm. — Lord Ley. — Miantonimoh. — Kilby Street. — Oliver's 
Dock. — Liberty Square. — The Stamp Office. — Broad Street. — Com- 
modore Downes. — Broad Street Riot. — India Street and Wliarf. — 
Admiral Vernon. — Crown Coffee House. — Butler's Row. — The 
Custom House, — Retrospective View of State Street. — Long Wharf. — 
The Barricado. — T Wharf. —Embarkation for Bunker Hill . . 88 

CHAPTER lY. 

BRATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 

Old Cornhill. — Paul Revere. — Amos and Abbott Lawrence. — Boyls- 
ton's Alley. — Barracks of the 29th. — Blue Anchor. — Brattle Street 
Church. — General Gage. — Howe, Clinton, and Burgojme. — John 
Adams. — Headquarters of Stage-Coaches. — Dock Square. — The 
Conduit. — Town Dock described. — Quincy Market. — Origin of Mar- 
kets in Boston. — The Triangular Warehouse. — Roebuck Passage. — 
Clinton Street. — The Old Market Museum. — Old Cocked Hat. — 
Faneuil Hall. — D'Estaing. — Lafayette. — Jackson. —Prince de Join- 
ville. — Jerome Bonaparte. — Lord Ashburton. — The Portraits, — 
Com Court. — Hancock House. — Talleyrand. — State Custom House. 

— The Consci'iption Riot 118 



CONTEXTS. IX 

CHAPTER V. 

FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 

Tlie North End. — Boston Stone. — Painters' Arras. — Louis Philippe. — 
Union, Ehu, and Portland Streets. — Benjamin Franklin's Residence. 

— The Blue Ball. — LJ^nan Beecher's Church. — Benjamin Hallowell. 

— Green Dragon. — Pope Day. — St. Andrew's Lodge. — INIill Pond. — 
Causeway. — Mill Creek. — North Street. — Sir D. Ochterlony. — East- 
ern Stage House. — Cross Street. — The Old Stone House. — New Brick 
Church. — The Red Lyon. — Nicholas Upshall. — Edward Randolph. — 
North Square. — Sir H. Frankland. — Major ShaAv. — Pitcairn, — Old 
North Church. — Cotton, Samuel, and Increase Mather. — Governor 
Hutchinson. — General Boyd. — Fleet Street. — King's Head Tavern. 

— Bethel Church. — Father Taylor. — Hancock's Wharf. — Swinging 
Signs. — First Uuiversalist Church. — First Methodist. — New North. 

— Ship Tavern. — Noah's Ark. — Salutation Tavern. — The Boston 
Caucus. — The North Battery. — Trucks and Ti'uckmen . . .143 

CHAPTER VI. 

A VISIT TO THE OLD SHIPYARDS. 

Early Ship-Building. — Boston Shipyards. — Massachusetts Frigate. — 
New Enghmd Naval Flag. — First Seventy-Four. — Hartt's Naval 
Yard. — The Constitution. — Her Launch, History, and Exploits. — 
Anecdotes of Hull, Bainbridge, and Decatur, — Old Ironsides Rebuilt. 

— Josiah Barker. — Nicholson. — Preble. — Stewart. — Other Distin- 
guished Officers. — Escape from the British Fleet. — Anecdote of Dr. 
Bentley. — Action with the Guerriere. — Tlie Java. — Cyane and Le- 
vant. — Relics of Old Ironsides. — Affair of the Figure-Head. — Cap- 
tain Dewey. — The Frigate Boston. — Capture of Le Berceau. — Tlie 
Argus 178 



CHAPTER YII. 

COPP'S HILL AND THE VICINITY. 

Copp's Hill. — British Works. — Ancient Arch. — Wm. Gray. — Old 
Ferry. — Reminiscences of Bunker Hill. — The Cemetery. — Curious 
Stones, Epitaphs, etc. — Old Funeral Customs. — Cliarter Street. — 
Sir William Phips. — John Foster Williams. — John Hull. — Colonial 
Mint. — Clirist Church. — Revere's Night Ride. — The Chimes. — The 
Vaults, — Legends of. — Major Pitcairn. — Love Lane. — North Latin 
School. — Prince Street. — Salem Church. — North End Heroes. — 
Captain Manly. — Massachusetts Spy. — First Baptist Church. — Sec- 
ond Baptist Church. — Draft Riot, 1863 198 



X CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER VIII. 

THE OLD SOUTH AND PROVINCE HOUSE. 

Marlborough Street, — Governor Winthrop. — Old South. — Warren's 
Orations. — Tea-Party Meeting, — British Occupation. — Phillis 
"Wheatley. — Spring Lane. — Heart and Crown. — Boston Evening 
Post. —Province House. — Samuel Shute, — William Burnet. — Wil- 
liam Shirley, — Thomas Pownall. — Francis Bernard. — General Gage. 

— Lexington Expedition. — Sir William Howe. — Coxmcil of War. — 
Court Dress and Manners. — Governor Strong. — Blue Bell and In- 
dian Queen. — Lieutenant-Governor Gushing. — Josiah Quiucy, Jr, — 
Mayor Quincy 225 

CHAPTER IX. 

FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 

Birthplace of Franklin. — James Boutineau, — Bowdoin Block, — 
Hawley Street, — Devonshire and Franklin Streets. — Joseph Barrell. 

— The Tontine. — Boston Librai'y. — Cathedral of the Holy Cross. — 
Bishop Cheverus. — Federal Street Theatre. — Some Account of Early 
Theatricals in Boston. — Kean, Finn, Macready, etc. — Jolm How- 
ard Payne. — Federal Street Church. — The Federal Convention. — 
Madam Scott, — Robert Treat Paine, — Thomas Paine, — Congress 
Street, — Quaker Church and Burying-Groimd. — Sketch of the So- 
ciety of Friends in Boston. — Merchants' Hall. — Governor Shirley's 
Funeral. — Fire of 1760. —Pearl Street. —The Ropewalks. — The ' 
Grays. — Conflicts between the Rope-Makers and the Regulars. — 
Pearl Street House, — Spurzheim. — Washington Allston. — Theophi- 
lus Parsons. — T. H, Perkins. — Governor Oliver. — Quincy Mansion. 
—Governor Gore. —Liverpool Wharf. —Tea Party and Incidents of. 

— The Sconce. — Governor Andros Deposed. — Sun Tavern. — Fort 
HiU 251 

CHAPTER X. 

A TOljR ROUND THE COMMON. 

Long Acre. — Tremont House. — Mr. Clay. — President Jackson.— 
Charles Dickens. — Little House-Lot. — Tremont Tlieatre. — The Ca- 
dets. — Adino Paddock, — Paddock's Mall. — Granary Burying- 
Ground. — The Granary. — Almshouse. — Workhouse. — Bridewell. 

— Park Street Cliurch. —Manufactory House. — Linen-Spinning In- 
troduced. — Elisha Brown. — Massachusetts Bank. — Incident of the 
Lexington Expedition. — The Common. — Its Origin. — Tlie Great 
Mall. — Fences. — Winter Street. — Governor Bernard. — John Mc- 
Lean. — Samuel Adams. — St. Paul's. — Masonic Temple. — Margaret 
Fuller. — Washington Gardens. — The Haymarket. — West Street. — 



CONTENTS. XI 

The Gun-House. — Colonnade Row. — Massachusetts Medical College. 

— Hayinarket Theatre. — Boylstou Street. — John Quiucy Adams. 

— General Moreau. — Charles Francis Adams ..... 2S9 

CHAPTER XI. 

A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON CONTINUED. 

Common Burying-Ground. — Joshua Bates. — Public Garden. — Rope- 
walks. — Topography of the Common. — British Troops on. — Descrip- 
tion of their Camps. — The Light Horse. — Powder House. — Old 
Elm. — Witchcraft and Quaker E.xecutions. — The Duel in 1728. — 
Mill-Dam. — Mexican Volunteers. — Beacon Street. — Prescott. — 
Copley. — John Phillips. — Wendell Phillips. — Robert C. Winthrop. 

— Hancock Mansion. — Governor Hancock. — General Clinton. — 
State House. — Public Statues, etc. — The Beacon. — The Monument. 

— Lafayette's Residence. — George Ticknor. — Malbone. — Samuel 
Dexter. — Incidents of Lafayette's Visit in 1824. — Josiali Quiucy, 

Jr. — Historical Resume. — Repeal of the Stamp Act .... 323 

CHAPTER XII. 

VALLEY ACRE, THE BOWLING GREEN, AND WEST BOSTON. 

Governor Bowdoin. — General Burgoyne. — Boston Society in 1782. — 
David Hinckley's Stone Houses. — James Lloyd. — Lafayette. — Dan- 
iel Davis. — Admiral Davis. — Historic Genealogical Society. — Valley 
Acre. — Uriah Cotting. — Governor Eustis. — Anecdote of Governor 
Brooks. — Millerite Tabernacle. — Howard Athenaeum. — Bowling 
Green. — Old Boston Physicians. — Charles Bulfinch. — New Fields. 

— Peter Cliardon. — Mrs. Pelham. — Peter Pelham. — Thomas Melvill. 

— Dr. William Jenks. — Captain Gooch. — West Church. — Leverett 
Street Jail. — Poor Debtors. — Almshouse. — Massachusetts General 
Hospital. — Medical College. — National and Eagle Theatres . . 361 

CHAPTER XIIT. 

FROM CnURCH GREEN TO LIBERTY TREE. 

Church Green. — New South Cliurch. — Dr. Kirkland. — American Head- 
quarters. — General Heath. — Anecdote of General Gates. — Jerome 
Bonaparte. — Sir William Pepperell. — Nathaniel Bowditch. — George 
Bancroft. — Trinity Cliurch. — Seven Star Inn and Lane. — Peter 
Faneuil. —Governor Sullivan. —Small Pox Parties. —Duke of Kent. 

— Sir Edmund Andros. —Lamb Tavern. —White Horse Tavern. — 
Colonel Daniel Messinger. — Lion Tavern. — Handel and Haydn So- 
ciety. — Lion Theatre. — Curious Statement about Rats . . .380 



Xll CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XIV. 

LIBERTY TREE AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 

Liberty Tree. — Its History. — Hanover Square. — Liberty Hall. — 
Hanging in Effigy. — Auchmuty's Lane. — The Old Suffolk Bench and 
Bar. — Boylston Market. — Charles Matthews. — James E. Murdoch. 

— Peggy Moore's. — Washington Bank. — Beach Street Museum. — 
Essex Street. — Rainsford's Lane. — Harrison Avenue. — Admiral Sir 
Isaac Coffin, — General John Coffin. — Anecdote of Admiral Coffin, — 
Sir Thomas Aston Coffin. — Henry Bass. — Old Distill-Houses. — 
Manufacture of Rum. — Gilbert Stuart, — Anecdotes of. — First Glass 
Works. — Disappearance of Trees. — Early planting of Trees. — Sir 
Roger Hale Sheaffe. — South Cove. — Hollis Street, — Colonel John 
Crane. — General Ebenezer Stevens. — Mather Byles, — Anecdotes of. 

— Hollis Street Church. — Fire of 1787 396 

CHAPTER XV. 

THE NECK AND THE FORTIFICATIONS. 

Tlie Neck described, — Measures to protect the Road, — Paving the 
Neck. — Henry T. Tuckerman. — Old Houses vs. Modern. — Massa- 
chusetts Mint. — The Gallows. — Anecdote of Warren. — Executions. 

— Early Fortifications. — The British Works and Armament. — Amer- 
ican Works. — George Tavern. — Washington's Staff. — His Personal 
Traits. — Washington House. — Washington Hotel. — Anecdotes of 
George Tavern, — Scarcity of Powder, — Continental Flags. — Entry 
of Washington's Army. — Entry of Rochambeau's Army. — Paul 
Jones 418 



INDEX 439 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Page 

America in Distress 359 

Ancient House in Dock Square 133 

Ancient Mill 199 

Ancient Ship 178 

Beacon, The 349 

Blue Ball, The 146 

Boston Stone 143 

Boston Theatre and Franklin Street 257 

Brattle Street Church 123 

British Lines on Boston Neck, 1775 425 

Cavalier 11 

Christ Church 213 

Colonial Currency, One Penny . . 237 

Colonial Currency, Two Pence 237 

Colonial Currency, Three Pence * . . . 238 

Colonial Stamp, Half-Penny 239 

Colonial Stamp, Two Pence 240 

Colonial Stamp, Three Pence 240 

Colonial Stamp, Four Pence 240 

Colony Seal 242 

Constitution's Figure-Head carried in the War of 1812 .... 182 
Constitution hauled up on the Ways 192 

Endicott cutting out the Cross 48 

Exchange Coffee-House 98 

Faneuil Hall before its Enlargement 134 

Faneuil Hall with Quincy Market 136 

Faneuil Hall Lottery Ticket 343 

Faneuil, Peter, Autograph 387 

First Baptist Church in 1853 151 

Franklin's Birthplace 252 

Frankland's Mansion 1(34 

Gage, General, Autograph 243 

Glasgow Frigate . 208 



XIV ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Granary Burying- Ground 297 

Great Mall, Hayniarket and Theatre . . . . . Frontispiece 

Hancock House 339 

Hollis Street Church 415 

Indian Wigwam .>.... 8 

Julien House 270 

King's Chapel in 1872 . . . 29 

Lafayette's Residence 353 

Liberty Tree 397 

Linen SiDiuuing-Wheel 302 

Massachusetts Cent of 1787 422 

Massachusetts General Hospital 377 

Mather Tomb 204 

Monument (Beacon Hill) . . 350 

New Brick Church 156 

New England Flag 179 

New North Church 173 

New South Church 380 

Old Brick auTrch 84 

Old Corner Bookstore 62 

Old Court-House 59 

Old Elm, The 330 

Old Federal Street Church 263 

Old King's Chapel 31 

Old Loom 322 

Old Printing-Press 79 

Old South 227 

Old State House in 1791 89 

Old Trinity Church • 386 

Parliamentary Stamp Half-Penny 81 

Parliamentary Stamp Shilling 81 

Park Street Church 301 

Pillory, The 93 

Pine-Tree Shilling, 1652 211 

Province House 235 

Repeal Obelisk 358 

Revere's Picture of Boston in 1768 ....... 119 

Saint Paul's Church 310 

Sears Estate 335 

Shirley, Governor, Ai-ms . .36 

Shirley, Governor, Portrait 28 

Ship of the Time of the Pilgrims 180 



ILLUSTRATIONS. XV 

Sign of Three Doves . , 147 

Six-Penuy Piece 212 

Speaker's Desk and "Winslow's Chair 347 

St. Botolph's Church 6 

Stocks, The 92 

Tea Chest 282 

Three-Penny Piece 212 

Triangular Warehouse 131 

Trimountain 3 

Trinity Church in 1872 387 

Trophy of Indian Weapons ^ 1 

United States Bank 95 

Washington's Lodgings 42 

West Church . . .374 

Window of Brattle Street Church, with Ball 124 

Winthrop fording the River 25 

W^oollen Spinning- Wheel 302 




INTEODUCTION. 



Myles Standish. — William Blackstoue. — Sha\vmi;t. — Settlement by Win- 
throp's Company. — Trimonntain. — Boston. — Physical Features. — Area. 
— Settlement by Indians. — Character of first Buildings. — First Location 
of the Settlers. — Geographical Divisions. — Wood and Water. — Dress. — 
Manners and Customs. — Slavery. — Curious old Laws. — Government of 
the Town. — Allotment of Lands. — Intolerance of the Times. — The 
Pulpit a Means of Intelligence. — Accounts by various Writers. — Towti 
Records. — General Growth and Progress. — Population. — Wards. — 
Paving the Streets. — Lighting the Streets. — Supply of Water. — En- 
largement of Boston. — Communication with Mainland. — Ferries. — 
Bridges. — Coaches, public and private. — Railways. 



AX old Boston divine says, " It would be no unprofitable 
thing for you to pass over the several streets and call to 
mind who lived here so many years ago." We learn from the 
poet Gay how to prepare for our rambles through the town : — 

" How to walk clean by day, and safe by night ; 
How jostling crowds with prudence to decline, 
When to assert the wall and when resign." 

To see or not to see is the problem presented to him who 
walks tlie streets of town or village. AVliat to one is a heap 
of ruins or a blank wall may to another become the abode of 
the greatest of our ancestors or the key to a remote period. A 
mound of earth becomes a battlement ; a graveyard, a collection 
of scattered pages whereon we read the history of the times. 

Facts are proverbially dry, and we shall trouble the reader 
as little as possible with musty records or tedious chronology ; 

1 A 



U LANDMAKKS OF BOSTON. 

but before we set out to explore and reconstruct, a brief glance 
at the material progress of Boston seems desirable. 

For a hundred years Boston must be considered as little 
more than a sea-shore village, straggling up its thicket-grown 
hillsides. The Indian camp-fire, the axe of Blackstone, the 
mattock and spade of Winthrop's band, — each have their story 
and their lesson. We shall pass each period in rapid review. 

Whether Myles Standish, "broad in the shoulders, deep- 
chested, with muscles and sinews of iron," was the first white 
man who stood on the beach of the peninsula is a matter merely 
of conjecture. Certain it is that in 1621 this redoubtable 
Puritan soldier, with ten companions, sailed from Plymouth and 
landed somewhere in what is now Boston Bay. They crossed 
the bay, " which is very large, and hath at least fifty islands in 
it " ; and, after exploring the shores, decided " that better har- 
bors for shipping there cannot be than here." They landed, 
hobnobbed with Obbatinewat, lord of the soil, feasted upon 
lobsters and boiled codfish, and departed, leaving no visible 
traces for us to pursue. This expedition was undertaken to 
secure the friendship of the " Massachusetts " Indians, — a 
result fully accomplished by Standish. 

The Indians told the Englishmen that two large rivers flowed 
into the bay, of which, however, they saw but one. This cir- 
cumstance, indefinite as it is, justifies the opinion that Stan- 
dish's party landed at Shawmut, the Indian name for our penin- 
sula. If they had landed at Charlestown and ascended the 
heights there, as is supposed by some writers, they could hardly 
have escaped seeing both the Mystic and Charles, while at 
Shawmut they would probably have seen only the latter river. 

In William Blackstone, Episcopalian, we have the first white 
settler of the peninsula. The date of his settlement has been 
supposed to have been about 1626, although there is nothing 
conclusive on this point known to the writer. Here he was, 
however, in 1628, when we find him taxed by the Plymouth 
Colony twelve shillings, on account of the expenses incurred 
by the colony in the caj^ture of Thomas Morton at Mount 
Wollaston."* 

* Belknap's American Biography. 



INTRODUCTION. 




TKIMOUNTAIN. 



The place where IMackstone located his dwelling has given 
rise to much controversy, but can be fixed with some degree 
of certainty. Like a sen- 
sible man, Blackstone chose ^-^-. --^^ 
the sunny southwest slope ^^^"^-^ =^^^^& 
of Beacon Hill for his res- _.— --^-^ ->^^^^^ 
idence. The records show " -i- 
that inApril, 1G33, ''it is ~ ^^" 
agreed that William Black- 
stone shall have fifty acres 
set out for him near his 
house in Boston to enjoy 
forever." In the following 
year Blackstone sold the 
town all of his allotment 
except six acres, on part of 
Avhich his house then stood ; the sale also including all his right 
in and to the peninsula, — a right thus, in some form, recog- 
nized by Winthrop and his associates. The price paid for the 
whole peninsula of Boston was £ 30, assessed upon the inhabi- 
tants of the town, some paying six shillings, and some more, 
according to their circumstances and condition. 

The Charlestown records locate Blackstone as " dwelling on 
the other side of Charles Eiver, alone, to a place by the Indians 
called Sliawmut,* where he only had a cottage at a place not 
far off the place called Blackstone's Point " ; this is also con- 
firmed by Edward Johnson in 1030, in his " AVonder Work- 
ing Providence." After the purchase by the town of Black- 
stone's forty-four acres, they laid out the " training field, which 
was ever since used for that purpose and the feeding of cattle." 
This was the origin of Boston Common. Two landmarks ex- 
isted to fix the site of BlackvStone's house, namely, the orchard 
planted by him, — the first in New England, — and his spring. 
Tlie orchard is represented on the early maps ; is mentioned in 
1765 as still bearing fruit; and is named in tlie deeils of sul> 

* Perliaps an abbreviation of " Mushauwonink," as given in Grindal llawson's 
" Confessions of Faith," printed in 1699, Probably meaning unclaimed land. 



4 LANDMAliKS OF BOSTON. 

sequent possessors. Tlie spring, whicli must have determined 
to some extent the location of tlie house, was probahly near the 
junction of Beacon Street with Charles, although others existed 
in the neighborhood. The six acres which Mr. Blackstone re- 
served have been traced through Richard Pepys, an original pos- 
sessor by a sufficiently clear connection, — supplied where broken 
by depositions, — to the jMount Vernon proprietors. Copley, the 
celebrated painter, was once an owner of Blackstone's six acres, 
which were bounded by the Common on the south and the 
river on the west. 

Blackstone was as singular a character as can be found in 
the annals of Boston. He is supposed to have come over with 
Eobert Gorges in 1623. But what induced him to withdraw 
to such a distance from the settlements remains a mystery. By 
a coincidence, his namesake. Sir William Blackstone, the great 
commentator of tlie laws of England, wrote at a later jDcriod the 
following lines : — 

"As by some tyrant's stern command, 
A wretch forsakes his natix'e land, 
In foreign climes condemned to roam, 
An endless exile from his home." 

The nature of Blackstone's claim to the peninsula is doubt- 
ful, though we have seen it recognized by Wintlirop's com- 
pany. ]\rather grumblingly alludes to it thus in his jMagnalia : 
" There were also some godly Episcopalians ; among whom has 
been reckoned Mr. Blackstone ; who, by happening to sleep 
first in an old hovel upon a point of land there, laid claim to 
all the ground whereupon there now stands the Metropolis of 
the whole English America, until the inhabitants gave him 
satisfaction." This concedes only a squatter's title to Black- 
stone. He seems to have had a kind heart, capable of feeling 
for the sufferings of his fellow-men, for, hearing of the vicissi- 
tudes of Wintlirop's infant settlement at Charlestown by disease 
and death, he invites them over to Shawmut in 1G30. AYater, 
the great desideratum of a settlement, was very scarce at 
Charlestown, and Blackstone " came and acquainted the Gov- 
ernor of an excellent spring there^ withal inviting him and 



INTRODUCTION. 5 

soliciting him tliither." If seclusion was Blackstone's object, 
it gave way to liis interest in the welfare of his fellow-colonists. 

Upon Blackstone's advice the Charlestown settlers acted, 
and many removed to Shawmut by the end of August, 1G30. 
In the tirst boat-load that went over was Anne Pollard, M'ho 
lived to be nearly, if not quite, one hundred and live years 
old. vShe herself related, when more than one hundred years 
of age, that she "came over in one of the first ships that 
arri^'ed in Charlestown ; that in a day or two after her arrival, 
on account of the water there being bad, a number of the young 
people, including herself, took the ship's boat to cross over to 
Boston ; that as the boat drew up towards the shore, she (being 
then a romping girl) declared she would be the lii-st to land, 
and accordingly, before any one, jumped from the bow of the 
boat on to the beach." According to this statement, which is 
based upon good authority, Anne Pollard was the first white 
female that tn)d upon the soil of Boston. Hudson's Point, now 
the head of Charlestown bridge, but formerly the site of the 
old ferry, was probably the place where Anne first left the 
impress of her foot. Her portrait, at the age of one hundred 
and three years, is in the possession of the ]Massachusetts His- 
torical Society, and her deposition, at the age of eiglity-nine 
years, was used to substantiate the location of Blackstone's 
house. In it she says that ^Ir. Blackstone, after his removal 
from - Boston, frequently resorted to her husband's house, and 
that she never heard any controversy about the land, between 
her husband, Pepys, or Blackstone, but that it Avas always 
reputed to belong to the latter. 

Blackstone, in 1634, removed to Pehoboth, not liking, we 
may conclude, the close proximity of his Puritan neighbors, of 
whom he is reported to have said, that he left Eughuul l)ecause 
of his dislike to the Lords Bishoj)s, but now he would not be 
under the Lords Brethren. 

In 1G59 Blackstone was married to ^lary Stevenson of 
Boston, widow, by Governor Endicott. He died in 107'), a short 
time before the breaking out of King Philip's War, during which 
his plantation was ravaged by the Indians, and his dwelling 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



destroyed, with his papers and books, — a circumstance that has 
prevented, perhaps, the veil being hfted that slirouds his early 
history. It is said no trace of his grave exists ; but he left 
his name to a noble river, and the city which he founded per- 
petuates it by a public square and street. 

The settlers at Charlestown called Shawmut Trimountain, not, 
says Shaw, on account of the three principal hills, — subse- 
quently Copp's, Beacon, and Fort, — but from the three peaks of 
Beacon Hill, which was then considered quite a high mountain, 
and is so spoken of by Wood, one of the early writers about 
Boston ; the reader will know that Beacon and its two outlying 
spurs of Cotton (Pemberton) and Mt. Vernon are meant. 

On the 7th of September, 1630 (old style), at a court 
held in Charlestown, it was ordered that Trimountain be called 

Boston. Many of the set- 
tlers had already taken up 
their residence there, and 
" thither the frame of the 
governor's house was car- 
ried, and people began to 
build their houses against 
winter." Clinging to the 
old associations of their 
native land, the settlers, 
named their new home for 
old Boston in Lincolnshire, 
England, whence a num- 
ber of members of the com- 
pany had emigrated. The 
name itself owes its origin 
to Botolph, a pious old 
Saxon of the seventh cen- 
tury, afterwards canonized 
ST. BoroLPH's, BOSTON, KsoLxsD. as tlie tutelar saint of mar- 

iners, and shows an ingenuity of corruption for which England 
is famed. Keciprocal courtesies have been exchanged l)etween 
English Boston and lier namesake. The former presented her 




INTRODUCTION. 7 

charter in a frame of the wood of old Saint Botolph's church, 
which hangs in our City Hall, while Edward Everett, in the 
name of the descendants and admirers of John Cotton, gave 
$ 2,000 for the restoration of a chapel in St. Botolph's, and the 
erection therein of a monument to the memory of that much 
venerated divine, who had been vicar of St. Botolph's and 
afterwards minister of the First Church of Christ in Boston, 
New England. 

Boston had three striking topographical features. First, its 
peninsular character, united by a narrow isthmus to the main 
land ; next, its three hills, of which the most westerly (Beacon) 
was the highest, all washed at their base by the sea ; and lastly, 
corresponding to her hills, were three coves, of which the most 
easterly, enclosed by the headlands of Copp's and Fort Hill, 
became the Town Cove and Dock. Of the other coves, the one 
lying to the south of the Town Cove was embraced between 
the point of land near the foot of South Street, formerly known 
as Windmill Point, and the head of the bridge to South Boston ; 
this bight of water was the South Cove. A third inlet on the 
northwest of the peninsula, lying between the two points of 
land from which now extend bridges to Charlestown and East 
Cambridge, became subsequently the Mill Pond, by the build- 
ing of a causeway on substantially the present line of Causeway 
Street. Only the most salient features are here given ; other 
interesting peculiarities will be alluded to in their places. 

At high tides the sea swept across the narrow neck, and 
there is every reason to believe also covered the low ground now 
traversed by Blackstone Street. This would make, for the time 
being, two islands of Boston. The early names given to the 
streets on the water front described the sea margin, as Fore 
(North) Beach, and Back (now Salem) Streets. 

In process of time these distinctive characteristics have all 
changed. Boston can no longer be called a peninsula ; one of 
its summits. Fort Hill, has to-day no existence, while the others 
have been so shorn of their proportions and altitude as to pre- 
sent a very different view from any quarter of approacli ; as for 
the three coves, they have been converted into terra Jirma. 



8 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



The area of original Boston has been variously estimated. 
By Shaw, at 700 acres ; Dr. Morse, tlie geographer, placed it in 
1800 at 700 acres, admitting that some accounts fix it as high 
as 1,000 acres, while Dr. Shurtleff says less than 1,000 acres. 

There is good authority, however, for computing the original 
peninsula at not more than 625 acres of hrm ground. To 
this has been added, by the filling of the Mill Pond, 50 acres ; 
the South Cove, 75 acres (up to 1837) ; and by the filling of the 
Town Cove or Dock, and the building of new streets on the 
water front, enough had been reclaimed by 1852 to amount to 
GOO acres, — nearly the original area. Since that time the 
Back Bay improvement, which covers 680 acres, and Atlantic 
Avenue, which follows the old Barricado line, have added as 
much more to the ancient territory, so that we may safely 
consider her original limits trebled, without reference to what 
has been acquired by annexation. 

At the time of the English settlement hostilities existed be- 
tween the Massachusetts and the eastern Indians ; tlie natives, 

who seldom neg- 
lected to provide 
^ for retreat in case 
^Rai of defeat, chose 
rather to locate 
their villages far- 
ther inland, at 
^lystic and else- 
r~MM A'here. 

There is evi- 
dence, however, 
^" that Shawmut was 
either inhabited by 
the Indians at a very early period, or used as a place of sepul- 
ture by them. Dr. Mather related that three hundred skull- 
bones had been dug up on Cotton (Pemberton) Hill when he 
was a youth, and tradition long ascribed to tliis locality a sort 
of Golgotlia. To support this view there was found in April 
1733, says the Kew England Journal, a number of skulls and 




INDIAN WIGWAM. 



IXTRODUCTIOX. 9 

larger liuman bones by workmen digging in a garden near Dr. 
Cooper's house on Cotton Hill. These remains were considered, 
at the time, to be those of the natives. Boston has been 
thoroughly excavated without finding any further material to 
confirm this belief. 

The cliaracter of the first buildings was extremely rude. 
They were of wood, with thatched roofs, and chimneys built 
of pieces of wood placed crosswise, the interstices and outside 
covered with clay. Such was the economy of the times, that 
Governor Winthrop reproved his deputy, in 1G32, "that he 
did not well to bestow so much cost about wainscotting and 
adorning his house in the beginning of a plantation, both in 
regard of the public charges, and for example." Tlie answer 
Avas, that it was for the warmth of his house, and tlie charge 
was little, being but clapboards nailed to the walls in the form 
of wainscot.'^ 

It is comparatively recent that Boston began to be a city of 
brick and stone. A few solidly built structures were scattered 
here and there over a wide area ; but the mass were of wood, in 
spite of some attempts made by the town to induce a safer and 
more durable stylo of architecture. A lady, entering Boston in 
1795, remarks: "The ranges of wooden buildings all situated 
witli one end towards the street, and the numerous chaises we 
met, drawn by one horse, the driver being placed on a low seat 
in front, a})peared to me very singular." Another writer ob- 
serves of tlie town in 1805 : "The houses were most of tliom 
wood, seldom enlivened by paint, and closely resembling tlie old- 
fashioned, dark-looking edifices still to be seen in Newport, R. I." 
At this time there was but one brick house in the whole of 
Tremont Street, and it was not until 1793 that the fh'st block 
of brick buildings was erected in what is now Franklin Street. 
In 1803 the inflammable character of the town was thus 
described : — 

" A p>Te of shapeless structures crowds the spot, 

Where taste, and all hut clieajjuess is forgot. 

One little spark the fiuieral pile may lire, 

And Post on, blazing, see itself expire." 

* Winthrop's Journal, p. 88. 
1* 



10 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Winthrop's company located chiefly within the space com- 
prised between what are now Milk, Bromtield, Tremont, and 
Hanover Streets and the water. Pemberton Hill was also a 
favorite locality, as we shall have occasion to note. The North 
End, by removals and accessions, soon became also settled ; 
that portion of the town lying north of Union Street being 
thus designated, while all south of that boundary was called 
the South End. A third geographical division, embracing the 
district lying to the west and north of Beacon Hill, and west 
and south of the JNIill Pond, was known as New Boston, and 
also as West Boston, and finally as the West End. These 
names have been retained, but the boundaries of all but the 
North End have been considered movable, and would be diffi- 
cult to follow. 

The first settlers found Boston thinly wooded, whatever its 
original condition may have been. The timber lay mainly 
along the Neck, with clumps of trees here and there. The great 
elm on the Common is doubtless one of native growth, and be- 
fore the I\e volution of 1776 there was anotlier almost equally 
large near the corner of what is now West and Tremont Streets. 
Traditions exist of the Indians having planted on the penin- 
sida, clearing away the wood, as is their custom, by burning. 
There are old houses now standing at the North End, the tim- 
bers of which, some of them a foot square, are said to have been 
cut near Copp's Hill. 

Water Avas abundant and good. Besides the spring or 
springs near Blackstone's house, mention is made in the early 
records of the "great spring" in what is now Spring Lane. 
The latter was filled up, but people now living have seen it 
bubbling out of the ground after heavy spring rains. Opinions 
are divided as to which spring Blackstone had reference, when 
he invited the thirsty Charlestown company to Shawmut, but 
the fact of Governor Winthrop having located by the side of 
the " great spring," and Isaac Johnson in the immediate vicin- 
ity, are significant. Other springs existed, or were found in 
course of time on the Neck and elsewhere. 

The settlement of Boston opens in the reign of Charles the 



INTRODUCTION. 11 

First, and tlie dress, as well as the manners and customs of the 
people bear the impress of that time, with the distinction, that 
the religious sentiments of the settlers entered largely into Ijoth 
questions. The short cloak, doublet, and silk stockings were 
worn by people of condition, but the colors were subdued and 
sober, and tlie rapier, which King Charles's gallants were so 
ready to draw, was not much worn abroad, except on state 
occasions. Some, like Winthrop, wore the stilf, plaited ruff, 
containing a furlong of linen, and making the modern beholder 
sympathize with the pillory the unfor- 
tunate head is placed in, while others 
wore the broad falling collar in which 
we always see the great Protector. High- 
crowned felt hats were worn out of doors, 
while the velvet skull-cap was the favor- 
ite headdress within. 

Myles Standish, whom we single out 
as a type of the Puritan soldier of those 
days, is described by Longfellow as " clad 
in doublet and hose, with boots of Cor- 
dovan leather " ; glancing complacently 
at his arms on the wall, "cutlass and 
corslet of steel, and his trusty sword of w^^s^^ 
Damascus," with its curved point and cavalier. 

Arabic inscription. The manner of wearing the hair became 
very early an apple of discord. Those of the straitest sect, and 
it may be of the straightest hair, cut their locks in the short 
fashion of the roundheads ; while others, to whom nature had, 
perhaps, been more lavish in this respect, wore their hair long. 
The wearing of veils by ladies when abroad was the subject 
of a crusade by Kev. John Cotton, though championed by 
Endicott. 

In 1750 cocked-hats, wigs, and red cloaks were usually 
worn by gentlemen. Except among military men, boots were 
rarely seen. In winter, round coats were worn, made stiff with 
buckram, and coming down to the knees in front. Boys wore 
wigs and cocked-hats until about 1790. Powder was worn by 
gentlemen until after 1800. 




12 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

The toilets of ladies were elaborate, especially the hair, which 
was arranged on crape cushions so as to stand up high. Some- 
times ladies were dressed the day before a party, and slept in 
easy-chairs to keep their hair in condition. Hoops were indis- 
pensable in full dress until after 1790. The usual dinner hour 
was two o'clock. Drinking punch in the forenoon, in public 
houses, was the common practice. Wine was little used, con- 
vivial parties drinking j^unch or toddy. 

The bearing of the townsj)eople in public was grave and 
austere. How could it be otherwise under the operation of 
such ordinances as the following. " No strangers were permitted 
to live within the town without giving bonds to save the town 
harmless from all damage and charge for entertaining them." 
" For galloping through the streets, except upon days of mili- 
tary exercise or any extraordinary case reijuire," was two 
shillings fine. Football was prohibited in the streets. '' Xo 
person shall take any tobacco publicly, under penalty of one 
shilling." "For entertaining foreigners," or receiving "in- 
mates, servants, or journeymen coming for help in physic or 
surgery, without leave of the selectmen," was twenty shillings 
fine a week. The selectmen had authority, under the colony, 
to order parents to bind their children as apprentices, or put 
them out to service, and, if they refused, the town took the 
children from the charge of the parents. 

Sobriety Avas strictly inculcated, though the sale of liquors 
was licensed. It is on record that, September 15, 1641, there 
was a training of twelve hundred men at Boston for two tlays, 
but no one drunk, nor an oath sworn. Officers were appointed, 
with long wands, to correct the inattentive or slumbering at 
church. To be absent from meeting was criminal, wlnle to 
speak ill of the minister was to incur severe punishment. An 
instance is mentioned of a man being fined for kissing his wife 
in his own grounds ; and do not the following instructions to 
the watch smack strongly of Dogberry's fiimous charge 1 The 
number being eight, they are " to walk two by two together ; 
a youth joined with an older and more sober person." " If 
after ten o'clock they see lights, to incpure if there be warrant- 



INTRODUCTION. 13 

able cause ; and if thoy hear any noise or disorder, ^yisely to 
demand the reason ; if they are dancing and singing vainly, to 
admonish them to cease ; if they do not discontinue, after 
moderate admonition, then the constable to take their names 
and acquaint the authorities therewith." " If they find young 
men and maidens, not of known fidelity, walking after ten 
o'clock, modestly to demand the cause; and if they appear 
ill-minded, to watch them narrowly, command them to go to 
their lodgings, and if they refuse, then to secure them till 
morning." 

]S"egro slavery appears in Boston as early as 1G38, when at 
least three were held by Maverick on Noddle's Island. In 
this year the ship Desire brought negroes here from the West 
Indies. In 1G80, according to Judge Sewall, there were not 
above two hundred African slaves in the colony. An effort 
is on record in 1702 to put a stop to negroes being slaves, 
and to encourage the use of white servants, the representa- 
tives of the toAvn being instructed to this purpose. Slavery 
seems, however, to have steadily increased in the colony, the 
trathc proving profitable, until at length it was as common to 
see negroes offered for sale in the public prints, as it ever was 
in the Southern colonies. In 1767 the town again moved, 
through its representatives for the abolition of slavery, to no 
effect. A Tory writer asserts that there were at this time 
two thousand slaves in Boston. During the troubles of 1768 
the British officers were charged with inciting the slaves to 
insurrection, and blacks were held in servitude until after the 
Ke volution. 

But this was not all. It is but little known that white 
slavery was tolerated in the colony, and that the miserable 
dependents of feudal power were sold into servitude in England 
and transported to this country. Prisoners of war were thus 
disposed of under the great Cromwell, some of the captives of 
Dunbar having been shipped over seas to America. A sliii> 
load of Scotch prisoners was consigned 1651 to Thomas Kem- 
ble of Charlestown, the same who was afterwards resident of 
Boston. They were generally sold for a specific term of ser- 



14 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

vice, and nsed chiefly as farm laborers. Many were sent to 
North Carolina, and indeed but few of the colonies were with- 
out them. 

Among the early customs was that of the watchmen crying 
the time of night and giving an account of the weather as they 
went their rounds, a practice which prevailed for a hundred 
years. The British sentinels later gave the cry of " All 's well ! " 
as they paced their beats. The ringing of the nine-o'clock bell 
was first ordered in 1649. The watchman's rattle was intro- 
duced about the time Boston became a city. 

The government of the town was vested in nine selectmen, 
and is first found on the records, November, 1643 ; but not until 
November 29, 1645, is the official statement recorded that John 
Winthrop and nine others were chosen selectmen. This con- 
tinued to be the form of government until the city was incor- 
porated, Feburary 23, 1822. The first city government was 
organized on the first of May following, and John Phillips was 
the first, Josiah Quincy the second, and Harrison Gray Otis 
the third mayor. Steps were taken as early as 1 708 to petition 
the General Court to have the town incorporated into a city or 
borough, and again in 1784, but without success. 

In 1632 the Colonial legislature declared it to be " the fittest 
place for public meetings of any place in the Bay," since which 
time it has remained the capital of Massachusetts. Boston at 
first included within its government the islands of the harbor, — 
Muddy River (Brookline), Winnisimet (Chelsea), Mount Wol- 
laston (Braintree), Randolph, and Quincy. She is now striving 
to recover portions of her ancient territory. 

For a long time the allotment of lands was the principal 
business of the town officers. In the limits of the peninsula 
the rule was, " two acres to plant on, and for every able youth 
one acre within the neck and Noddle's Island " (East Boston). 
In 1635 it was agreed, " no new allotments should be granted 
unto any new-comer, but such as may be likely to be received 
members of the congregation." The town regulated the price 
of cattle, commodities, victuals, and the wages of laborers, and 
none other were to be given or taken. 



INTRODUCTION. 15 

The spirit of intolerance wliich the fathers of Boston exhib- 
ited towards the Quakers, Anabai:)tists, EpiscopaUans, and 
otlier sects ilkistrates their view of religious liberty. Well 
did Dry den say : — 

*' Of all the tyrannies on human kind, 
The worst is tliut which persec\;tes the mind ; 
Let us but weigh at what offence we strike, 
'T is but because we cannot tliink alike ; 
In punishing of this we overthrow 
The laws of nations, and of nature too." 

It was an offence to harbor a Quaker ; to attend a Quaker 
meeting Avas a fine of ten shillings, to preach, £ 5. When the 
Baptists first attempted to enter their meeting-house in Still- 
man Street, they found the doors nailed up, and when they 
proceeded to worship in the open air, they were arrested and 
imprisoned. No one could be found to sell land for an Episco- 
pal church, nor could they find a place to hold services in until 
Andros obtained the Old South for them by force. The crimi- 
nal law decreed banishment to such as broached or maintained 
''damnable heresies," by which was meant such as did not 
agree with the views of the congregation. 

The excessive severity of the following deserves notice. 
" Any one denying the Scripture to be the word of God should 
pay not exceeding £ 50 to be severely whipped, not exceeding 
forty strokes, unless he publicly recants, in which case he shall 
not pay above .£10, or be whipped in case he pay not the fine." 
The repetition of this offence was to be punished by banish- 
ment or death, as the court might determine. 'T is death 
for any child of sound understanding to curse or strike his 
parents, unless in his own defence." 

There is a grim humor in the folloAvnng decisions. In 1640 
one Edward Palmer, for asking an excessive price for a pair of 
stocks, which he was hired to frame, had the privilege of sit- 
ting an hour in them himself. " Captain Stone is sentenced 
to pay £ 100, and prohibited coming within the patent with- 
out the governor's leave, upon pain of death, for calling Mr. 
Ludlow (a magistrate) a " Justass.''^ We infer the punisliment 
must have been inflicted more for the joke tlian the offence. 



16 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

" Catherine, wife of William Cornisli, was found suspicious of in- 
continency, and seriously admonished to take heed." " Sergeant 
Perkins ordered to carry forty turfs to the fort for being drunk." 

According to Neal, the principal festival days were that of 
the annual election of magistrates at Boston, and Commence- 
ment at Cambridge. Business was then laid aside, and the 
people were as cheerful among their friends and neighbors as 
the English are at Christmas. 

" They have a greater veneration for the evening of Saturday than 
for that of the Lord's Day itself ; so that all business is laid aside 
by sunset or six o'clock on Saturday night. The Sabbath itself is 
kept with great strictness ; nobody being to be seen in the streets 
in tune of Di\'ine ser^dce, except the constables, who are appointed 
to search all public houses ; but in the evening they allow them- 
selves great liberty and freedom." 

This custom has prevailed up to a comparatively late period. 

In those days the pulpit took the lead in matters temporal 
as well as of theology. Public questions were discussed in 
the pulpit, and news from a distance, of moment to the col- 
ony, was disseminated through it ; the first newspaper was not 
attempted in Boston until 1690, and then only a single 
number was published. The whole field was open to the 
preacher, who might either confine himself to doctrinal points 
or preach a crusade against the savages. The attire of the 
ladies, the fashion of the hair, the drinking of healths, after- 
wards abolished by law, were all within the jurisdiction of 
the teacher of the people ; the constituted authorities might 
make the laws, but the minister expounded them. The official 
proclamations were then, as now, affixed to the meeting-house 
door, which thus stood to the community as a vehicle of public 
intelligence. 

Many intelligent travellers, both English and Erench, have 
recorded their impressions of Boston. Wood, who is accounted 
the earliest of these writers, says : — 

" This harbor is made by a great company of islands, whose high 
cliffs shoulder out the boisterous seas ; 3'et may easily deceive any 
miskilful pilot, presenting many fair openings and broad sounda 



INTRODUCTION. 17 

which afford too shallow water for ships, thou^'h navigahle for boats 
and ])iiiriaces. It is a safe and pleasant harbor within, having but 
one common and safe entrance, and that not very broad, there 
scarce being room for three ships to come in board and board at a 
time ; but being once in, there is room for the anchorage of five 
hundred ships." 

" Boston is two miles N. E. of Roxbury. His situation is very 
pleasant, being a peninsula hemmed in on the south side by the 
bay of Roxbury, and on the north side with Charles River, the 
marshes on the back side being not half a (j^uarter of a mile over ; 
so that a little fencing will secure their cattle from the wolves ; it 
being a neck, and bare of wood, they are not troubled with these 
great annoyances, wolves, rattlesnakes, and mosquitoes. This neck 
of land is not above four miles in compass, in form almost square, 
having on the south side a great broad hill, whereon is planted a fort 
which can command any ship as she sails into the harbor,'^ On the 
north side is another hill equal in bigness, whereon stands a wind- 
mill. t To the northwest is a high mountain, with three little rising 
hills on the top of it, wherefore it is called the Tramount.J This town, 
although it be neither the greatest nor the richest, yet is the most 
noted and frequented, being the centre of the plantations where the 
monthly courts are kept." 

John Jossleyn arrived at "Boston July, 1663. He says : — 

" It is in longitude 315 degrees, and 42 degrees 30 minutes of 
north latitude. The buildings are handsome, joining one to the 
other as in L(mdon, with many large streets, most of them ]xived 
with pebble ; in the high street, toward the Common, there are fair 
buildings, some of stone ; the town is not divided into parishes, yet 
they have three fair meeting-houses." 

Edward Johnson says : — 

" The form of this town is like a heart, naturally situated for forti- 
fications, having two hills on the frontier part thereof next the sea, 
the one well fortified on the superficies thereof, with store of great 
artillery well mounted. The other hath a very strong battery built 
of whole timber, and filled with earth ; betwixt these two strong 
arms lies a cove or bay, on which the chief part of this town is 
built, overtopped with a third hill ; all these, like overtopping 
towers, keep a constant watch to see the approach of foreign 
dangers, being furnished with a beacon and loud babbling guns to 

* Fort Hill, + Copp's Hill. Beacon Hill. 



18 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

give notice to all the sister towns. The chief edifice of this city-like 
town is crowded on the sea-banks, and wharfed out with great labor 
and cost ; the buildings beautiful and large, some fairly set forth 
with brick, tile, stone, and slate, and orderly placed with seemly 
streets, whose continual enlargement presageth some sumptuous city." 

M. I'Abbe Robin, who accompanied the army of Count Ro- 
chambeau, published a small work in 1781, in which a good 
description of Boston is given. Says M. I'Abbe : — 

" The high, regular buildings, intermingled with steeples, appeared 
to us more like a long-established town of the Continent than a 
recent colony. A fine mole, or pier, projects into the harbor about 
two thousand feet, and shops anel warehouses line its whole length. 
It communicates at right angles with the principal street of the 
town, which is long and wide, curving round towards the water ; 
on this street are many fine houses of two and three stories. The 
appearance of the buildings seems strange to European eyes ; being 
built entirely of wood, they have not the dull and heavy appear- 
ance which belongs to those of our continental cities ; they are regu- 
lar and well-lighted, with frames well joined, and the outside cov- 
ered with slight, thinly planed boards, overlapping each other some- 
what like the tiles upon our roofs. The exterior is j^ainted generally 
of a grayish color, which gives an agreeable aspect to the view." 

]\I. I'Abbe states that codfish was the principal article of 
commerce with the Bostonians ; that they preferred Maderia, 
Malaga, or Oporto to French wines, but their ordinary beverage 
was rum, distilled from molasses. Some credit attaches to this 
statement, when we remember that Boston had half a dozen 
still-houses in 1722, and a score when the Abbe was writing. 
" Piety," continues the acute Frenchman, " is not the only 
motive which brings a crowd of ladies into their church. 
They show themselves there clothed in silk, and sometimes 
decked with superb feathers. Their hair is raised upon sup- 
ports, in imitation of those worn by the French ladies some 
years since. They have less grace, less freedom, than the 
French ladies, but more dignity." 

"Tlieir slioon of velvet, and their mnilis ! 
In kirk they are not content of stuilis, 
The sermon wlien they sit to heir, 
But carries cuslieons like A'ain fulis ; 
And all for newfangleness of geir." 



INTRODUCTION. 19 

The Abbe, alluding to the strict observance of the Sabbath, 
naively says : " A countryman of mine, lodging at the same 
inn with me, took it into his head one Sunday to play a little 
upon his tiute ; but the neighborhood became so incensed that 
our landlord was obliged to acquaint him of their uneasiness." 
Another French writer remarked of Newport, which he thought 
Boston resembled, " This is the only place I ever visited where 
they build old houses." INI. le Compte Segur and the ^lar- 
quis Chastellux have ^vritten about Boston, but there is little 
to add to what is already given. 

The first volume of the Town Records begins SoptomT)er, 
1634, and the first entries are said to be in the handwriting of 
Governor Winthrop. An unknown number of leaves have been 
torn out or destroyed, and, as the first business of the town 
was the allotment of land to the inhabitants, the loss is ir- 
reparable, and has proved such to those who have had occasion 
to trace the titles of property. The city authorities should see 
that this volume, the sole repository of many facts in the early 
history of Boston, should be printed at once, and thus pre- 
served from destruction. Several later volumes of the records 
are missing, and for many years, while William Cooper was 
Town Clerk, no record exists of the births or deaths. A man- 
uscript volume called the "Book of Possessions," is in the 
City Clerk's office, compiled, it is thought, as early as 1634, by 
order of the General Court. There are two hundred and forty- 
five names in this " Doomsday Book," as it has been termed, 
but all of them were not original settlers. 

The general growth and progress of the New England 
metropolis has been steady and remarkable. The early settlers 
having built wholly of wood, were not long exempt from de- 
structive fires. In 1654 occurred what was known as "the 
great fire," but its locality is not given. This was succeeded 
by another in 1676, at the Xorth End, which consumed forty- 
five dwellings, the North Church, and several warehouses, 
within the space enclosed by Richmond, Hanover, and Clark 
Streets. After this fire a tire-engine was imj)orted from Eng- 
land, but another great fire in 1678, near the Town Dock, 



20 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

destroyed eighty dwelling-houses and seventy warehouses, en- 
tailing a loss of £ 200,000. 

AVith extraordinary energy these losses were repaired, and 
the townspeople, a(hnonislied by their disasters, built their 
houses witli more regard to safety, — many building of stone 
and brick, — while more efficient means were obtained for con- 
trolling the devouring element. The town was divided into 
four (quarters, patroled by a watch detailed from the foot-com- 
panies. Six hand-engines, four barrels of powder, and two 
crooks were assigned each quarter. This appears to have been 
the beginning of a fire department. 

Tlie first fire-engine made in Boston was built by David 
Wheeler, a blacksmith in Newbury, now Wasliington Street. 
It was tried at a fire August 21, 1765, and found to perform 
extremely well. 

The data from wdiich to estimate the population of tlie town 
in the first decade of its settlement is very meagre. In 1639 
the Bay mustered a thousand soldiers in Boston, but tliey 
were of course drawn from all the towns. For the first seventy 
years after its settlement Boston did not probably contain over 
seven thousand people. In 1717 it was reckoned at only 
twelve thousand. A hundred years after the settlement it con- 
tained fifteen thousand, with seventeen hundred dwellings ; in 
1752 tliere were seventeen thousand five hundred, — a decrease 
of five hundred in the previous ten years, accounted for by 
the wars with the Indians and French, in which Boston sus- 
tained severe losses. In 1765 the number of people had 
fallen below sixteen thousand, with sixteen hundred and 
seventy-six houses. During the siege in 1775-76 the town 
was nearly depopulated, but few remaining Avho could get 
away. An enumeration made in July, 1775, before the last 
permission was given to leave the town, showed only six thou- 
sand five hundred and seventy-three inhabitants, the troops 
witli tlieir women and children numbering thirteen thousand 
six hundred. At the peace of 1783 there were only about 
twelve thousand inhabitants. By the first census of 1791 the 
number of people was a little over eighteen thousand, with 
two thousand three hundred and seventy-six houses. 



INTRODUCTIOX. 21 

From tliis period the increase has been steady and rapid. 
In 1600 there were twenty-live thousand; \S'20, forty-tliree 
thousand; 1840, eiglity-iive thousand; 18G0, one hundred and 
seventy-seven thousand, and in 1870, the latest census, two 
liundred and fifty thousand. 

Tlie division of the town into eight wards is mentioned as 
early as the great lire of 1678 - 79. In 1715 these wards were 
named North, Fleet, Bridge, Creek, King's, Change, Pond, and 
South. In 1735 tlie number of wards was increased to twelve, 
corresponding with the number of companies in the Boston 
regiment, one of which was attached to each ward for service 
at tires. Besides tlie military there was also a civil division, 
an overseer of the poor, a fireward, a constable, and a scavenger, 
belonging to each ward. In 1792 the number of military 
wards was nine, the regiment having been reduced to that num- 
ber of companies ; the civil division continued to be twelve. 
The first four of these wards, and the greater part of the fifth, 
were in the Xorth End ; tlie seventh was at the West End ; 
while tlie rest, with a part of the fifth, were in the South End, 
as it was then bounded. The present number is sixteen, just 
double the original nimiber. 

The paving of the public thoroughfares seems to haA^e begun 
at a very early period. Jossleyn, describing Boston in 16G3, 
says most of the streets " are paved with pebble," meaning the 
smooth round stones from the beach. It was not the practice 
at first to pave the whole Avddth of a street, but only a strip in 
the middle ; the Neck Avas so paved. In the same manner the 
sidewalks were paved with cobble-stones, bricks, or flags, of 
only Avidth enough for a single passenger; in some instances, 
where flag-stones were used, the remaining space Avas tilled with 
cobble-stones. It is probable that the first paving Avas done in 
a fragmentary Avay l)efore 1700, but in 1703-04 the toAvn A^oted 
£100 for this purpose, "as the selectmen shall judge most 
needful, having particular regard to the highw^ay nigh old Mrs. 
Stoddard's house." An order for paving 42 rods of Orange 
Slreet Av^as made in 1715. From this time sums Avere regu- 
larly A^oted,and the foundation laid for the most cleanly city in 
America. 



22 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

As to sidewalks, a lady who came to Boston in 1795 from 
New York, and was much struck with the quaint appearance 
of the to^YJ^, writes : — 

" There were no brick sidewalks, except in a part of the Main 
Street (Washington) near the Old South, then called Comhill. 
The streets were paved with^ pebbles ; and, except when driven on 
one side by carts and carriages, every one walked in the middle 
of the street, where the pavement was the smoothest," ^ 

It is not believed that there was a sidewalk in Boston until 
after the Eevolution. At tliis time State Street was without 
any, the pavement reaching across the street from house to 
house. 

It is probable that those inhabitants whose business or 
pleasure took them from home after dark must for a long time 
have lighted their own way through the devious lanes and by- 
ways of the town. We can imagine the feelings of a pair of 
fond lovers who, taking an evening stroll, are bid by the cap- 
tain of the watch to " Stand ! " while he throws the rays of a 
dark lantern upon the faces of the shrinking swain and his mis- 
tress. Yet, although street-lamps were said to have been used 
as early as 1774, until 1792 there seems to have been no action 
on the town's part towards lighting the streets, when we read 
that the "gentlemen selectmen propose to light the town," 
early in January of that year, " and to continue the same until 
the sum subscribed is expended." Those gentlemen that pro- 
posed to furnish lamps were requested to have them " fixed " 
by a certain day, so that the lamplighter may have time to 
prepare them for lighting. To the public spirit of the citizens, 
then, is due the first shedding of light upon the gloomy ways 
of the town. Gas was not used to illuminate the streets until 
1834, though the works at Copp's Hill were erected in 1828. 
In December of that year gas was first used in the city. 

The springs which supplied the older inhabitants gave 
place to wells, and these in their turn gave way to the de- 
mand for an abundant supply of j^ure water for the whole town. 

* Quincy Memoir. 



INTRODUCTION. 23 

"Wells liatl to be sunk a depth varying from fifteen feet on the 
low ground to one hundred and twenty feet on the elevated 
portions, and the water was usually brackish and more or less 
impregnated with salt. Water was therefore introduced from 
Jamaica Pond, in West Eoxbury, by a company incorporated in 
1795. The pipes used were logs, of which about forty miles 
were laid. The trenches were only three to tliree and a half 
feet in depth, which did not prevent freezing in severe weather, 
wliile the smallness of the pipe, — four-inch mains, — rendered 
the supply limited. 

Under the administration of Mayor Quincy the subject of 
a new supply of water was agitated. In 1825 a great fire 
occurred in Xilby Street, destroying fifty stores, and the want 
of water as a means for the subduing of fires became evident. 
Twenty years were spent in controversy before action was 
taken, but in August, 184G, ground was broken at Lake Cochit- 
uate by John Quincy Adams and Josiah Quincy, Jr. In Octo- 
ber, 1848, the work was completed, but the growth of Boston 
has rendered this source insufficient in less than twenty years, 
and the w^aters of Sudbury Eiver are to be made tributary. 

Boston has enlarged her territory by the annexation of Dor- 
chester Xeck (South Boston), in 1804 ; Washington YiUage" in 
1855 ; Eoxbury, in 1868 ; and Dorchester, in 1870. East Bos- 
ton (Xoddle's Island), though forming a part of Boston since 
1637, had neither streets nor local regulations until the incor- 
poration of the East Boston Company ; public officers first set 
foot upon the island in 1833. There was then but one house 
in the whole of that now populous ward, comprising six hun- 
dred and sixty acres. South Boston, when annexed, had only 
ten families on an area of five hundred and seventy acres, and 
but nineteen voters. There being at this time no bridge, the 
inhabitants were obliged to come to Boston via the Xeck. 
The building of a bridge was the condition of annexation. 
South Boston was taken from the territory of Dorchester, 
lioxbury, itself a city, brought a large accession to Boston, to 
which it had long been joined in fact. Dorchester, settled a 
few months earlier than Boston, has become a ward of the 



24 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

metropolis. These two towns brought an increase to the popu- 
lation of about forty thousand, and a territory of nearly seven 
thousand acres. 

Communication between Boston and the surrounding towns 
was at first wholly by the Neck. The people of Chelsea thus 
had a circuit of at least a dozen miles, and a day's journey 
before them, to go to town and return. There was a ferry es- 
tablished at Charlestown and Winnisimmet (Chelsea) as early 
as 1635, - — five years after the settlement of Boston. We find 
by the records that Thomas INIarshall " was chosen by generall 
consent for y^ keeping of a Ferry from y^ INIylne Point vnto 
Charlestown and Wynneseemitt, for a single p'son sixpence, and 
for two, sixpence ; and for every one above y^ number of two, 
two pence apiece." Ships' boats were first used, then scows, 
and this continued to be the only means of transit until 1786. 
Four years previous to this the Marquis Chastellux states that 
he was one hour making the voyage from Winnisimmet in a 
scow filled with cattle, sheep, etc. Seven tacks were required 
to bring them safely to land. 

A bridge to Cambridge was agitated as long ago as 1739. 
The obstruction to the passage of ferry-l)oats by ice was a 
serious inconvenience. Charles River Bridge, from the Old 
Ferry landing to Charlestown, was the first constructed. The 
first pier was laid on the 14th June, 1785, and the bridge 
thrown open for travel in little more than a year. This was 
considered at the time the greatest enterprise ever undertaken 
in America, and its successful completion was celebrated by a 
public procession, consisting of both branches of the Legislature, 
the proprietors and artisans of the bridge, military and civic so- 
cieties. Salutes were fired from the Castle, Copp's and Breed's 
Hill. This was only eleven years after the battle of Bunker 
Hill. Thomas Russell was first president of the corporation. 

West Boston Bridge, to Cambridge, was opened in November, 
1793. Dover Street, or Boston South Bridge, was next opened 
in the summer of 1805. Cragie's, or, as it used to be called. 
Canal Bridge, from the Middlesex Canal, was next completed 
in August, 1809, from what was then known as Barton's Point, 



IXTKODUCTION. 



on the Boston side, to Leclimere's Point in Caml)ri(lge. By a 
bridge thrown across from Lechmere's Point to Charlestown, 
the lung detour around Charlestown Neck was avoided. The 
Western Avenue, or Mill Dam, as it was long called, was 
opened with great ceremony July, 1821. The South Boston 
Bridge, from what was respectively Windmill and Wheeler's 
Point, at the foot of Federal Street, to South Boston, was com- 
l)leted in 1828, and shortened the journey into Boston, by 
way of the Xeck, about a mile. Warren Bridge met with 
great opposition from the proprietors of Charles liiver Bridge, 
but was opened as a public highway 
December, 1828. This completes 
the list of the older avenues of tra- 
vel to the mainland ; but we have 
now a magnificent iron structure 
to South Boston, recently erected, 
wliile the numerous railway bridges 
spanning the river enable the city 
to stretch its Briareus-like arms in 
every direction for traffic. 

Coaches are hrst mentioned as 
being in use in Boston in 1668-69. 
Captain Anthony Howard appears 
to have owned one in 1687, for he 
was fined twenty shillings that year 
" for setting a coach-house two feet 
into y« streete at y« X. End of y« Towne." * In 1798 there 
were 98 chaises and 47 coaches, chariots, phaetons, &c. in all 
Boston. In October, 1631, Governor Wintlu-op went on foot 
to Lynn and Salem, and until there were roads it is obvious 
there was little use for wheeled vehicles, even for such as 
coidd afford them. In 1750 there were only a few carriages, 
and these, chariots and coaches. Four-wheeled chaises were 
in use in families of distinction. The first public coacli or 
hack used in Boston was set up in 1712 by Jonathan Wardell, 
at the sign of the Orange Tree, head of Hanover Street. One 



4^ 




WINTHROP FORDING THE RIVER. 



* Town Records. 



26 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

was also set up by Adino Paddock, in 1762, who called it the 
"Burling Coach," from its London prototype. Paddock was 
a coachmaker by trade ; we shall have occasion to notice him 
in these pages. The next public vehicle was a small post- 
chaise, drawn by a pair of gray horses, and stood at the head 
of State Street, about 1790. Gentlemen and ladies who at- 
tended balls and parties in those times had to walk, unless 
they coidd get a cast in a friend's carriage. 

Coaches for public conveyance were first established in 1763, 
when one was put on the route between Boston and Ports- 
mouth, N. H. Bartholemew Stavers was the "undertaker," 
and Ms head-quarters were at the sign of the Lighthouse, at the 
North End. The " Portsmouth Flying Stage Coach," as he 
styled liis carriage, carried six inside passengers, each paying 
thirteen shillings and sixpence sterling, to Portsmouth. The 
stage and horses were kept at Charlestown, to save the troitlDle 
of ferriage, and set out every Friday morning, putting up at 
the inns along the road. Eeturning, the stage left Portsmouth 
every Tuesday morning. Stavers gave notice "that as this 
was a convenient and genteel way of travelling, and greatly 
cheaper than hiring carriages or horses, he hoped ladies and 
gentlemen would encourage the same." '^ A stage was put on 
the route to ^Larblehead in 1769, by Edward Wade. His car- 
riage was a post-chaise, suited for ladies and gentlemen, and he 
himself might be " spoken with at the widow Trefry's in Fish 
(Xorth) Street." 

Railways were early under discussion by the people of 
Boston, but no decisive steps were taken until 1825. The first 
road chartered in the State was the Experiment Railroad at 
Quincy. Next came the Lowell, incorporated in 1830, fol- 
lowed by the Worcester, Providence, and others. The Lowell 
was the first opened for public travel, in June, 1835, closely 
followed by the Worcester in July of the same year ; the Prov- 
idence was also opened in 1835, with a single track. The 
INTaine was opened from Wilmington to Andover in 1836 ; to 
South Berwick, 1843. Tlie Eastern comes next, in 1838, in 

* Drake, p. 664. 



INTRODUCTION. 27 

which year it was opened to Salem. George Peabody was the 
first president. The Old Colony began operating in November, 
1845, the Fitchburg in 1845, and the Hartford and Erie in 
1849, under the name of the Norfolk County Eoad. It is a 
curious fact, that every one of the eight railway stations in 
Boston stands on ground reclaimed from the sea. 

We have taken the reader tlirough the settlement, physical 
features, and successive phases of the growth of the Old Town, 
and now that we are about to commence our rambles together, 
we warn him to be prepared for changes that will make it diffi- 
cult and often impossible to fix localities accurately. For 
fifty years our men of progress have been pidling down the old 
and building up the new city. Few of its original features are 
left except, in the North End. 



CHAPTER I. 
king's chapel and the neighborhood. 

Historj' of the Chapel. — Establishment of the Church of England. — Chapel 
Burial-Ground. — Boston Athen^um. — Academy of Arts and Sciences. — 
Historical Society. — The Museum. — The Old Corner. — Royal Custom 
House. — Washington. — H. G. Otis. — Daniel Webster. — Tremont Street. 
— Howard Street. — Pemberton Hill. — Endicott. — Captain Southack. — 
Theodore Lyman, Senior. — John Cotton, — Sir Henry Vane. — Samuel 
Sewall. — Gardiner Greene. — Earl Percy. — Bellingham. — Faneuil. — 
Phillips. — Davenport. — Oxenbridge. — Beacon Street. — School Street. — 
Latin School. —Franklin Statue. —City Hall. —Otis. —Warren, — Mas- 
carene. — Cromwell's Head. — The Old Corner Bookstore. — Anne Hutchin- 
son. — The French Church. — Catholic Church. — Second Universalist, — 
Province Street. — Chapman Place, — James LovelL — Wendell. 



WE choose King's Chapel for our point of departure, as 
well from its central position as from the fact that 
its vicinage is probably the oldest ground built upon in Bos- 
ton, Blackstone's lot alone excej)ted. 

The exterior of King's Chapel 
does not present any remarkable 
architectural features. It has an 
air of solidity and massiveness 
that seems to bespeak the inten- 
tion of its builders tliat it should 
remain where it was placed. 
This purpose is likely to be set 
at naught by tlie proposed re- 
moval of tlie Chapel northward- 
ly, to widen School Street. So 
improbable an idea never entered 
the heads of the founders ; but 
GOVERNOR SHIRLEY. ^vc luakc uothiug uowachiys of 

taking up blocks of brick or stone bodily, and moving them 
whither we list. 




KINGS CHAPEL AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 



29 



King's Chapel is the fifth in the order of Boston churches. 
The architect was Peter Harrison, of Newport, R. I., and the j)lan 
embraced a steeple, which Mr. Harrison thought essential to his 
general design, and would have a " beautiful ellect." For want 




king's chapel as it appears in 1S72. 



of funds, however, the steeple was never built. Governor 
Shirley laid the corner-stone on the 11th of August, 1749, and 
after giving the workmen £ 20 (old tenor) to drink his health, 
went into the old church, which was still standing, wliere a 
service appropriate to the occasion was held by lie v. Mr. Caner, 
the rector. 

Mr. Harrison had been requested to present drawings with 
both a double and single tier of windows. Two rows were 
adopted, the lower ones giving that prince of punsters, ^latlier 
Byles, an opportunity of saying that he had heard of the 
canons of the church, but had never seen the port-holes before. 

The stone for the chapel came from Braintree, and was taken 



30 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

from the surface of the ground, no quarries being then opened. 
The rough appearance of the stone is due to the limited knowl- 
edge of the art of dressing it which then prevailed. 

Greenwood's little work on King's Chapel gives the follow- 
ing fticts. It was first erected of wood in the year 1688, en- 
larged in 1710, and, being found in the year 1741 in a state of 
considerable decay, it was proposed to rebuild it of stone. A 
subscription for this purpose was set on foot, and Peter Faneuil 
(of Faneuil Hall memory) was chosen treasurer of the building- 
fund. The building was to be of stone, and was to cost 
£ 25,000 (old tenor). It was not to be commenced until 
£ 10,000 were subscribed. 

Among the first subscribers were Governor William Shirley, 
Sir Charles Henry Frankland, and Peter Faneuil. The Gov- 
ernor gave £100; Sir H. Frankland, £50; Faneuil, £200 
sterhng. Faneuil died in 1742, and the matter was for some 
time laid aside, but was revived by Mr. Caner in 1747. A 
new subscription was drawn up. Governor Shirley increased 
his gift to £200, and Sir H. Frankland to £150 sterling. 
For the subscription of Peter Faneuil the society was obliged 
to sue his brother Benjamin, who Avas also his executor, and 
recovered it after a vexatious suit at law. 

Tlie new chapel was built so as to enclose the old church, in 
wliich services continued to be held, in spite of its ruinous con- 
dition, until March, 1753, when the society was obliged to 
remove to Trinity. The congregation having applied for the 
use of the Old South on Christmas day, a verbal answer was 
returned granting the request on condition "that the house 
should not be decorated with spruce," etc. 

Efforts to obtain money to complete the chapel were made 
in every direction. Among others. Captain Tliomas Coram, 
founder of the Foundling Hospital in London, who had re- 
sided in this country, was applied to by a gentleman tlien in 
London ; but no sooner had he mentioned the object of his visit 
than he was obliged to listen to a burst of passionate reproaches 
for some alleged slight the vestry of King's Chapel had formerly 
put upon liim. The old gentleman finally told his visitor, with 



king's chapel and the neighborhood. 



31 




an oatli, " that if the twelve Apostles were to apply to him in 
behalf of the church, he Avould persist in refusing to do it." 

The portico was not conijjleted until 1789. In that year 
General Washington was in Boston, and attended an oratorio 
in the chapel, which had for its object the completion of the 
portico. The general was 
dressed in a black velvet suit, 
arid gave five guineas towards 
this purpose. 

The old building, which 
gave place to the present one, 
had an a})ology for a tower, 
on the top of which was a 
crown, and above this a cock 
for a vane. A gallery was 
added after the enlargement 
in 1710, and the pulpit was 
on the north side. Opposite old king's chapel. 

was a pew for the governors, and near it another for officers 
of the British army and navy. In the west gallery was the 
first organ ever used in Boston, given to the society by Thomas 
Brattle. A bell was purchased in 1689, and a clock was do- 
nated in 1714 by the gentlemen of the British Society. The 
walls and pillars were hung with the escutcheons of the King, 
Sir Edmund Andros, Governors Dudley, Shute, Burnet, Bel- 
cher, and Shirley, and formed a most striking contrast wnth the 
bare widls of the Puritan churches of the town. In the pulpit, 
according to the custom of the times, was an hour-glass to mark 
the length of the sermons, while the east end was adorned with 
an altar-i)iece, the Ten Commandments, Lord's Prayer, etc. The 
emblems of heraldry have disappeared. It was the usage of the 
church to place the royal governors at the head of the vestry. 

As you enter the chapel, at your left hand is the monument 
of William Yassall, erected by Florentine Yassall, of Jamaica, in 
17GG. To the right is a beautiful monumental tabUit dedicated 
to the memory of the young men of the chapel who fell in the 
late civil war. 



32 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

On the south side are mural tablets to William Sullivan, John 
Lowell, Thomas Newton, — an original founder, — and Frances 
Shirley, wife of the Governor. Within the chancel are busts 
of Greenwood and Freeman, rectors, and of their successor Dr. 
Peabody. The burial-ground side contains tablets to Charles 
Apthorp and Samuel Apj^leton. Over the vestry are the names 
of Charles Pelham Curtis, long the treasurer, and of William 
Price, a patron of the church. These are about the only monu- 
mental marbles to be seen in our city churches, though others 
have mural tablets. The Vassal monument, a beautiful specimen 
of the art in the last century, is by Tyler, a London sculptor. 
These add interest to the church, and reflect in a modest way 
the glories of old St. Paul's and of Westminster Abbey. 

The first bell was cracked, while tolling for evening service. 
May 8, 1814. The wits seized upon the accident with avidity, 
and commemorated it in the following effusion (Paul Pevere re- 
cast the bell, and some churchman answered the innuendo) : — 

" The Chapel church, " The church still lives, 
Left in the lurch, The priest survives, 

Must surely fall ; With mind the same. 

For cliurch and people Revere refounds, 

And bell and steeple The bell resounds, 

Are crazy all. And all is well again, " 

The present organ of King's Chapel was procured from Eng- 
land in 175G, and paid for by private subscription. It cost 
£ 500 sterling, and was said to have been selected by the im- 
mortal Handel himself, though the great maestro was then 
blind. Over this organ a crown and a couple of gilt mitres 
are placed which have a history of their own. 

In the year 1775, when P>oston was in a state of siege, the 
British military and naval officers worshipped in King's Chapel, 
as they had in fact done during the previous years the town 
was in occupation of the British soldiers. The burial of three 
soldiers of the Sixty-fifth Kegiment are the last-recorded inter- 
ments in the Chapel cemetery previous to the evacuation of the 
town in March. The rector. Dr. Caner, went to Halifax with 
the king's troops, taking M^ith him the church registers, plate, 
and vestments. The service, which had in part been presented 



king's chapel and the neighborhood. 33 

by the King, amounted to two thousand eight liundred ounces 
of silver. It was never recovered. 

When the society of King's Chapel were ready to rebuild, in 
1748, they desired an enlargement of the ground for their site 
a few feet northwardly, also a piece of ground at the east sidQ, 
on part of which then stood the Latin School. After a good 
deal of negotiation between the town and the church committee, 
the church erected a new school-house on the opposite side of 
the street on land belonging to Colonel Saltonstall, where the 
Latin School remained up to a comparatively recent time. The 
removal of the old school-house was viewed with no flivorable 
eye by the townspeople, and Joseph Green, a Harvard graduate 
of 1726, and a noted Avit, expressed the popular feeling thus: — 

" A fig for your learning ! I tell you the to^Nii, 
To make the church larger, must pull the school do\vn. 

* Unhappily spoken ! ' exclaims Master Birch ; 

* Then learning, it seems, stops the growth of the church.' " 

After the departure of the royal troops, the popular furor 
against everything savoring of their late allegiance to the 
throne found expression in the removal of the royal emblems 
from public buildings, changing the names of streets and every- 
thing that bore any allusion to the obnoxious idea of kingly 
authority. King's Chapel was therefore newly baptized Stone 
Cliapel, a name that has in turn been discarded for the old, 
liigh-sounding title of yore. In the reign of Queen Anne the 
church was called " Queens Chappell." 

The establishment of the Church of England in Boston was 
attended witli great 02:>position. The Puritans, who had fled 
from the persecutions of that church in the old country, had 
no idea of admitting it among them in the new. In 1646 a 
petition praying for the privilege of Episcopal worship, addressed 
to the General Court at Boston, caused the petitioners to be 
fined for seditious expressions, and the seizure of their papers. 
Charles 11. , after his accession, ^v^ote to the colony requiring, 
among other things, that the laws should be " reviewed " so as 
to permit the Episcopal form of worship, the use of the Book 
of Common Prayer, etc. The chief people and elders of the 
2* c 



34 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

colony looked upon the efforts of the profligate Charles II. in 
behalf of religious liberty as they would upon the quoting of 
Scripture by his Satanic Majesty, and paid little heed to the 
mandate of the merry monarch of whom his favorite Eochester 
wrote, — 

** Here lies our sovereign Lord the King, 
Whose word no man relied on ; 
Who never said a foolish thing, 
And never did a wise one." 

The King, when over his bottle, commanded Eochester to 
write him a suitable epitaph, "something api:)ropriate and 
witty." The Earl, seizing his pen, wrote as above, and for liis 
keen effusion remained some time in disgrace. 

In 1686, in the reign of James II., the first Episcopal services 
were held in the Old Town House, which then stood on the 
site of the Old State House. Eev. Eobert Eatclift' was the 
first Episcopal clergyman, and came over in the Eose frigate in 
May, 1686. The town, however, continued to refuse the use 
of any of the meeting-houses, and the society were unable to 
buy land on Cotton (now Eemberton) Hill to build on. Edward 
Eandolph — the first officer of customs that Boston had, a man 
specially hated for his successful efforts to have the king revoke 
the colonial charter — may be considered as chiefly instrumental 
in setting up the Episcopalians in Boston. Eandolph was also 
at this time one of his Majesty's council for Xew England. 

Sir Edmund Andros, who arrived in Boston in December, 

1686, after having several conferences with the ministers on 
the subject of using one of the meeting-houses for Episcopal 
services, sent Eandolph, on Wednesday, the 22d of March, 

1687, to demand the keys of the South Meeting-houSe, now 
Old South. On Good Friday, which was the following Friday, 
the sexton opened the doors by command of Andros " to open 
and ring the bell for those of the Church of England." 

But time, which makes all tilings even, gave the Old South 
Society a signal revenge for what they considered little less than 
sacrilege. King's Chapel, abandoned by its rector and con- 
gregation when the town was evacuated, remained closed until 
the autumn of 1777, when it was occupied by the Old South 



KINGS CHAPEL AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. do 

Society, whose house had been converted into a British riding- 
school. Tliis society used the Chapel about five years. 

King's Chapel stands as a monument to mark the resting- 
place of Isaac Johnson, the second white inhabitant of Boston. 
The locality of the grave is unknown, and is likely to remain 
so, omng to the many changes, both past and prospective, in 
the old burial-ground. Johnson, under whose direction the 
settlement of Boston mainly proceeded in its incipient steps, 
selected for himself the square enclosed by Tremont, Court, 
"Washington, and School Streets. So says tradition on the 
authority of Chief Justice Sewall. Johnson died in September, 
1630, and was buried at his own request at the southwest 
end of his lot. This solitary grave was the nucleus around 
which gathered the remains of the first settlers, and constituted 
the first place of sepulture in the town. The old church of 
1688 was erected on the burying-ground, it is conjectured by 
authority of Andros ; the town would not have permitted the 
use of the public burying-ground for this purpose. 

Johnson's history has a touch of romance. He married 
Lady Arabella, daughter of the Earl of Lincoln. She left her 
native land and a life of ease to follow her husband to the 
aWIcIs of America. She died very soon after her arrival, in 
Salem, and was probably buried there ; but the location of her 
grave, like that of her husband, who so soon followed her, is 
unknown. Johnson's death was said to have been hastened by 
the loss of his amiable and beautiful wife. It was to the 
memory of the Lady Arabella that ]\Irs. Sigourney "wrote, — 

" Yet still she hath a monument 
To strike the pensive eye, 
Tlie tender memories of tlie land 
Wherein her ashes lie." 

It is a popular belief that the Chapel Burying-Ground, or 
" Old Burying-Place," as it was first called, contains the mortal 
remains only of such as were of the Episcopal fiiith ; but this 
is very far from being the case. The dust of Governor AVin- 
throp, of John Cotton, Davenport, Oxenbridge, and Bridge, 
pastors of the First Church, and of other Puritans of the stern- 



36 



LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 




-eJ^^K^^ 



SHIRLEY ARMS. 



est type, lie under the shadow of a detested Episcopal edifice. 
Besides these, the remains of Governor Shirley and of Lady 
Andros repose here. Here may be 
seen on the tombstones the arms and 
escutcheons of the deceased, carry- 
ing us back to the days of heraldry. 
Under the Chapel are vaidts for the 
reception of the dead. 

As we look through the iron gate 
into the enclosure, the curious ar- 
rangement of the gravestones strikes 
us. In the centre the headstones form 
a sort of hollow square, as if to repel 
further aggression upon the territory of the dead, while at 
the sides and walls the same plan is observed. This peculiar 
arrangement was the chef dtoeuvre of a former Superintendent 
of Burials ; many stones were removed from their original posi- 
tions, and now give effect to the proverb, " to lie like a tomb- 
stone." What would the future or even present seeker after 
the grave of an ancestor do in such a case of perplexity? 
Doubtful, in a certain sense, of the legend " Here lies," he would 
restrain his emotion, fearing that the tear of affection might 
fall on the ashes of a stranger. 

King's Chapel Burying-Ground is by no means exempt from 
the ghostly legends that usually attach to cemeteries. One is 
recorded of a negro-woman, whose coffin the careless carpenter 
having made too short, severed the head from the body, and, 
clapping it between the feet, nailed down the lid to conceal his 
blunder. Another is related of a person who was asserted to 
have been buried alive. A hue-and-cry was raised, the corpse 
was exhumed in the presence of a mob which had gathered, 
and it needed the assurance of the doctors who examined the 
remains to set the affair at rest. The mob, disappointed of its 
expected sensation, proposed to bury the old woman who had 
raised the uproar, but did not execute the threat.* Interments 
ceased here in 1796. 



* Dealings with the Dead. 



king's chapel and the neighboiuiood. 37 

Xext uortliei'ly from the "buiying-ground once stood an old 
wooden building covered Avith rough cast. It was the residence 
of some of the rectors of King's Chapel, and of Dr. Caner, the 
last one. This building was occupied by the Boston Athenaeum 
in 1810, and was taken down about forty years ago, to give place 
to the stone building occui)ied later as a Savings Bank and by 
the Historical Society. The Athenaeum, now so conspicuous 
among literary institutions, owes its origin to the Anthology 
Club, an association of gentlemen for literary purposes. They 
conducted a periodical called the Montldy Anthology, and in 
it published proposals in 1806 for subscriptions for a public 
reading-room. Success following this effort, it was determined 
to add a library, and trustees were appointed for the manage- 
ment. The rooms were first opened in Joy's Buildings, on the 
west corner of Congress and AVater Streets ; then in Scollay's 
Building in Tremont Street ; and later, in the location first 
mentioned. 

The Boston Athenaeum became incorporated in February, 
1807, and occupied three rooms in the old rough-cast building. 
The first was the news or reading room ; the second, the library 
of the Athenaeum and American Academy ; the third, the pri- 
vate library of John Quincy Adams, now in a building erected 
for it in the garden of the old mansion at Quincy. 

^Ir. Shaw, in his history published in 1817, gives the follow- 
ing particulars with regard to the library at that time : " The 
library of the Athenaeum contains upwards of ten thousand 
volumes. The collection in history and biography is very 
complete, and in American History unrivall*! ; \mder this 
head may be noticed three thousand ])amphlets. Twenty-one 
foreign and about twelve American periodicals are received." 
In 1822 the Athenieum was removed to Pearl Street, near the 
corner of High, to a building partly purchased and partly pre- 
sented by James Perkins. At this time the library possessed 
seventeen thousand five hundred volumes and ten thousand 
tracts. It now contains ninety-seven tliousand six hundred 
volumes. 

The Athenjeum was removed in 18-40 to Beacon Street, 



38 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

where its spacious halls, devoted to sculpture and painting, 

attract the lovers of art, no less than its unrivalled library and 

extensive reading-rooms draw to its shrine the student in every 

department of literature. Pope tells us, — 

" A little learning is a dangerous thing ; 
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring." 

Here we may drink to intoxication, and avoid the danger he 
points out. This institution has received munihcent contri- 
butions ; among others may be named twenty-hve thousand 
dollars nobly donated at once by John Bromiield. Thomas 
H. Perkins was a generous benefactor, and many other eminent 
Bostonians have aided it liandsomely. 

The corner-stone of the elegant freestone building on 
Beacon Street was laid in April, 1847. The design was by 
Edward C. Cabot, but some interior alterations were made 
under the direction of Billings. The site was the estate of 
Edward B. Phillips, but the jDroprietors had purchased the 
ground on whicli the Museum stands in Tremont Street, with 
the intention of building there. This ground was sold. The 
original members of the Anthology Club, founders of the Athe- 
naeum, were John Sylvester John Gardner, William Emerson, 
Arthur ]\I. Walter, William S. Shaw, Samuel C. Thacher, Joseph 
S. Buckminster, Joseph Tuckerman, AVilliam Tudor, eJr., Peter 
0. Thacher, Thomas Gray, William Wells, Edmund T. Dana, 
John C. Warren, and James Jackson. 

The Athenaeum contains, among other Avorks of art, marble 
busts of Dr. Kirkland, by Greenough; of Chief Justice IMar- 
shall, by Erazee ; of AY. H. Prescott, by Greenough ; Crawford's 
marble statues of Hebe and Ganymede, and of Orpheus ; a 
bust of Loammi Baldwin, by Powers ; and Greenough's Shep- 
herd Boy in bronze. In the superb collection of paintings are 
Allston's portrait of West, and his Isaac of York ; portraits by 
Eembrandt and Vandyke; a cattle piece by Cuyp; a Holy 
Family by Murillo, and landscapes by Yanderwert. The origi- 
nal portraits of Wasliington and Avife, by Stuart, were pur- 
chased for fifteen hundred dollars in 1831. Besides these are 
several unfinished works of Allston. 



KINGS CHAPEL aND THE NEIGHBUIHIOOD. 6V 

The Academy of Arts and Scieuces is the oldest institution 
with literary objects in Boston, and the second in America. ]t 
was instituted in 1779, and received a charter the next year, 
in which the design of the Academy is stated to be, '' the pro- 
motion of the knowledge of the antiquities of America and of 
the natural history of the country." The number of members 
is limited to two hundred. 

Governor Bowdoin was the first president, followed by John 
Adams, Edward A. Holyoke, J. Q. Adams, Nathaniel Bowditch, 
John Pickering, and other distinguished persons. Count Bum- 
ford left a legacy within the control of the Academy to ad- 
vance the cause of science. The society occu2)ies a room in 
the Athenanim. 

The Historical Society originated as early as 1791. On 
the 24th of January, Hon, Judge Tudor, Bev. Drs. Belknap, 
Thacher, and Eliot, Judge AYinthrop of Cambridge, Bev. Dr. 
Freeman, Judge Minot, Hon. W. Baylies of Dighton, Judge 
Sullivan, afterwards governor of Massachusetts, and Thomas 
AVallcutt, met and organized. The meetings were first held in 
Judge ]\linot's office in Spring Lane, but the use of a corner 
room in the attic of Faneuil Hall was soon obtained, *' a place 
as retired and recondite as explorers into the recesses of antiij- 
uity would think of visiting." In 1791 the society occujued 
the ^lanufactory House in Hamilton Place. In 1793 the 
society was offered a room in the Tontine Crescent, on the 
south side of Franklin Street, over the arch, tlie entrance into 
Arch Street. Charles Ihdhnch, William Scollay, and Charles 
Vaughan, who reclaimed Franklin Street from a quagmire, made 
this ofi'er, and here the society remained until 1833, when it 
removed to its late (piarters in Tremont Stret't, from whicli it is 
now tt^nporarily ousted by the repairs of tlu; building. The 
situation in Franklin Street presented the singular phase of a 
building without land, as it rested upon an arched passage- 
way. 

Governor Gore was president in 180G. In 1838 tlie society's 
collections amounted to six thousand volumes and manuscripts. 
The society possesses many relics of historic interest. It has 



40 LANDMARKS OF BOSTOX. 

portraits of Governors Endicott, Winslow, Pownall, Dummer, 
Belcher, AVinthrop, Hutchiusou, Strong, Gore, etc. That of 
Winslow is supposed to be a Vandyke. The swords of Gover- 
nor Carver, ^lyles Standish, Colonel Church, Governor Brooks, 
Sir Wilhani Pepperell, and those of Captain Linzee and Colo- 
nel Prescott, worn at Bunker's Hill, are the property of the 
society. Not the least curious among these relics is a silk* flag 
presented by Governor Hancock to a colored company called 
the " Bucks of America," bearing the device of a pine-tree and 
a buck, above which are the initials " J. H." and " G. W." 
There is also a gun used at the capture of Governor Andros by 
the Bostonians in 1689 ; the samp-bowl of King Philip, and 
the lock of the gun with which lie was killed. 

The library of the society has a value not to be estimated in 
dollars and cents. It was the foundation of materials for the 
history of New England, many of which have been published 
in the society's valuable collections. 

Among other valuable donations to the society may be men- 
tioned the papers and documents of General William Heath of 
Revolutionary fame, besides the magnificent library of Thomas 
Dowse of Cambridge, containing about five thousand volumes, 
many being of the greatest historical interest. 

The Museum building, which covers twenty thousand feet 
of land, and cost a quarter of a million, is one of the attractive 
objects of the street and of the city. For many years its rows 
of exterior lights have been a lamp in the path of the pedes- 
trian and a lure to its votaries. On its boards have stood in 
times past the elder Booth and Mrs. George Barrett. Booth, 
of whom a capital likeness in crayon, by Rowse, hangs in the 
main hall, deserves to be classed with Kean, Kemble, and the 
giants of tlie stage. His unfortunate penchant for convivial in- 
dulgence has given rise to many anecdotes. On one occasion, 
while playing at the Howard, Tom Ford, the manager, stipu- 
lated that Booth should sul)mit to be locked in liis room by a 
certain hour, in order that the actop might not be in a condition 
to disappoint the audience, as was sometimes the case. The 
chagrin of the manager may be imagined at finding the tragedian 



king's chapel and the neighbokhood. 41 

intoxicated when lie came to fetch him to the theatre. Booth 
had bribed a waiter to bring Hquor to liis door, where succes- 
sive glasses were emptied by means of a straw througli the key- 
hole. As Iiichard III. Booth Avas incomparable. He often 
became greatly excited in the combat scene, and on one occa- 
sion it is stated that he attacked W. H. Smitli, the veteran 
actor, lately deceased, in dead earnest, driving him from the 
stage, and pursuing him into the street. 

AVilliam Warren, the first comedian of the American stage, 
made his first appearance at the Museum in 1847, and after 
twenty-tive years of service is still without a peer in his pecu- 
liar parts. Adelaide Phillips, whose triumphs on the lyric 
stage are well known, was a danseuse at the Museum in the 
year just mentioned. By the generosity of Jenny Lind and 
other friends she was enabled to obtain a musical education in 
Europe. 

The present Museum is near the site of the old Columbian 
Museum, which passed through many mutations, and was 
finally destroyed by fire in January, 1807. The Columbian 
Museum originated in the exhibition of wax-works at the 
American Coffee House in State Street, opposite Kilby, as 
early as 1791. Mr. Bowen, the proprietor, removed to what 
was called " the head of the Mall," at the corner of Bromfield's 
Lane (now Street) in 1795. This building was burnt in Janu- 
ary, 1803 ; but ]\Ir. Bowen was enabled to reopen his Museum 
in Milk Street, at the corner of Oliver, in May of that year. 
In 1806, a brick building five stories high w^as erected by Doyle 
about where the present Probate Office is, and reached by a pas- 
sage Irom Tremont Street. It was opened Thanksgiving evening. 

The destructive element soon swept away this edifice. It 
took fire about midnight, and was consumed with all its con- 
tents ; not an article was saved. The event was signalized by 
a painful disaster. A large crowd of spectators had collected 
in the burying-ground adjoining, when the walls fell, killing 
nine or ten boys, from twelve to fifteen years old. Dr. "WilHam 
Eustis, afterwards govej-nor of ^Massachusetts, resided then in 
Sudbury Street, and with otlier j)hysirians lent his aid on the 



42 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



occasion. The undismayed proprietors had a new two-story 
building erected by June, 1807, which continued until 1825, 
when the collection was sold to the New England Museum. 

The New England Museum — formed from the New York 
Museum, which was opened in 1812, in Boylston HaU ; from 
Mix's New Haven Museum, added in 1821 ; and from the 
Columbian — was opened by Mr. E. A. Greenwood, July 4, 
1818. It was situated on Court Street, and extended from 
Cornhill to Brattle Street, occupying the upper stories. In 
1839 Moses Kimball became the proprietor, and these several 
establishments, merged in the New England, constituted the 
present Museum, first located on the present site of Horticul- 
tural HaU in 1841, and in 1846 where it now stands. 

At the corner of Court and Tremont Streets was the resi- 
dence of John Wendell, an old Boston merchant of the time 
of Governor Shirley. He married a daughter of Judge Edmund 
Quincy, and was the nephew of Hon. Jacob Wendell, a leading 
Bostonian in the troublous Eevolutionary times. 

The Eoyal Custom House was located in AYendell's house in 
1759, at which time George Cradock, Esq., a near neighbor of 
Wendell's, was collector. 

The old building now standing here, then of only three sto- 
ries, is the one in which Washington lodged during his visit 
^ €fc^^^fc^^._^- in 1789, as you may read 

^^^ryi,:^-.--^.^..-- ^:^. :.^ ^j^ ^^^^ small tablet placed 

in the Court Street front. 
At the time Washington 
occupied it, it Avas kept by 
Joseph Ingersoll as a board- 
ing-house. The coming of 
Washington to the town he 
had delivered in 177G was 
marred by an act of official 
punctilio on the part of Gov- 
ernor Hancock, Avhich caused 
the greatest mortification 
alike to the people and the 
illustrious visitor. 




king's chapel and the neighborhood. 43 

On tlic ^^lTi^'al of the general on the Neck, he was met by 
tlie suite of tlie governor, but not by the governor, whose views 
of State sovereignty would not admit of his acknowledging a 
superior personage witliin his olHcial jurisdiction. The day 
was cold and raw, and Washington, chagrined at the absence 
of the governor, Avas about to turn his horse's head to depart, 
when he was prevailed upon by the authorities of the town to 
enter it. 

A long delay had occurred at the Xeck, and many people 
caught what was called the "Washington cold." The general 
wore his old continental uniform, and rode on horseback with 
his head uncovered, but did not salute the throngs that lined 
his way. On arriving at the Old State House, Wasliington 
would not ascend to the balcony prepared for him at the west 
end, until assured that the governor was not there ; and after 
the passage of the procession before him, retired to his lodgings. 
To add to the coldness of his reception, a cold dinner awaited 
him ; l)ut his landlord procured and placed before his guest a 
fish of great excellence, and thus saved liis credit at the last 
moment. 

AVashington himself declared the circumstance had been so 
disagreeable and mortifying that, notwithstanding all the marks 
of respect and affection he had received from tlie inhabitants 
of Boston, he would have avoided the place had he anticipated 
it.* 

Governor Hancock, perceiving that he had made a fiasco, 
hastened to repair it. General Washington had declined his 
invitation to dinner, so the governor caused himself to be car- 
ried next day to the general's lodgings, where he presented 
himself swathed in flannels as a victim of gout. The general 
received the governor's excuses with due civility, whatever may 
have been his i)rivate con\actions, and so the affair terminated. 

!Mad;im Hancock, indeed, related afterwards that the gover- 
nor was really laid up with gout, and that Washington shed 
tears when he saw the servants bringing the helpless man into 
his presence. Governor Drooks, and Hon. Jonathan Jackson, 

* Hundred Boston Orators. 



44 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

then Marshal of the District, dined with the general on the 
day of his arrival, but did not hold this view, and the affair 
was freely discussed at table. Hancock seems to have yielded 
to the popular pressure which condemned his conduct. He 
was said to have been jealous of Washington's elevation to the 
Presidency. The general returned the governor's visit, was 
affable among friends, but stood on his dignity when strangers 
were present. 

Harrison Gray Otis was one of the first who occupied this 
old corner for a law office. In his day it was considered quite 
on one side, though only a few paces distant from the Court 
House. ]Mr. Otis came upon the stage a little before the open- 
ing of the Eevolutionary conflict. He remembered seeing Earl 
Percy's reinforcements mustering for their forced march to 
Lexington. A pupil of Master Lovell at the Latin School, 
in 1773, he was removed to Barnstable during the siege of 
Boston, where he quietly pursued his studies, graduating at 
Harvard at eighteen. He was an able lawyer, and until the 
advent of Mr. Webster, — about which time ho relinquished 
practice, — was the acknowledged leader of the Boston bar. 
Judge Story thought him the greatest popular orator of his day. 
His personal appearance was elegant and attractive ; his voice, 
strong and melodious, often sounded in Faneuil Hall. 

Mr. Otis was prominently identified with public affairs. In 
politics he was a Federalist, and a leader of that party in Con- 
gress from 1797 to 1801. He was also an influential member 
of the celebrated Hartford Convention. In 1817, after filling 
a number of State offices, Mr. Otis went into the United States 
Senate ; and became mayor of his native city in 1 829. He 
was the grandson of Harrison Gray, treasurer of the colony and 
a Royalist, and nephew of James Otis, the patriot. Gifted in 
oratory, with a winning manner and p dished address, Harrison 
Gray Otis ranks liigli among Boston's public men. One of the 
public schools is named for him. 

In the building we are inspecting was once the law office of 
the great expounder of the Constitution, Daniel Webster, who 
first came to Boston in 1801, and studied law with Cliristo- 



king's chapel and the neighbokhood. 45 

pher Gore, afterwards Governor of jMassachusetts. He kept 
school a short time for his brother Ezekiel, in Short Street, 
since Kingston. Edward Everett, who lived with his mother 
in Xewbury Street, was about ten years old, and went at this 
time to Webster's school. 

It is related of Mr. Webster, that when a young man, about 
to begin the study of law, he was advised not to enter the 
legal i)rofession, as it was already crowded. His reply was, 
J' There is room enough at the top." ^Ir. Webster removed to 
Portsmouth, N. H., returning to Boston in 181 G, and in 1820 
he was a member of the Massachusetts Constitutional Conven- 
tion. His orations at the laying of the corner-stone of Bunker 
Hill ^Monument, June 17, 1825, when Lafayette was present, 
and also on its completion, June 17, 1843, are familiar to every 
school-boy. An unsuccessful candidate for the Presidency in 
1836, he entered the cabinet of General Harrison in 1840, as 
Secretary of State, negotiating the long-disputed question of 
boundary with Great Britain by the Ashburton treaty. His 
great reply to Hayne of South Carolina, in the Senate, in 
which he defended New England against the onslaughts of the 
Southern Senator, made him the idol of the people of Boston. 
This speech, which opens with the graphic simile of a ship at 
sea in thick weather, her position unknown and her crew tilled 
with anxiety, was, it is said, delivered without preparation, 
amid the gloomy forebodings of the Xew England men in 
Washington. His wife, even, who heard the fiery harangue of 
Hayne, feared for the result ; but the " Northern Lion " reas- 
sured lier with the remark that he would grind the Southern 
Senator " finer than the snuff in her box." 

Notwithstanding the sledge-hammer force of Webster's elo- 
quence he was often at a loss for a word, but when it came to 
him it was exactly the right one. His clearness of expression 
is well illustrated by the following anecdote of David Crockett, 
who, having heard Mr. Webster speak, accosted hmi afterwards 
Avith the inquiry, "Is this Mr. Webster?" "Yes, sir." 
" Well, sir," continued Crockett, " I had heard that you were 
a very great man, but I don't think so. I heard your speech 
and understood every word you said." 



46 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Mr. Webster's hesitation for a suitable expression is well 
described by the following anecdote. At a meeting in Faneiiil 
Hall he was arguing in favor of the " Maysville Road " bill, 
with his usual jDOwer, and remarked, "I am in favor, Mr. 
Chairman, of all roads, except, excej^t — " Here he stuck, at 
fault for a word, until Harrison Gray Otis, who sat near him 
on the platform, said in a low voice, " Say except the road to 
ruin." Mr. Webster adopted the suggestion, and used it as if 
he had merely paused to make his remark more effective. 

In Bench and Bar, it is related that, while Webster was 
Secretary of State, the French Minister asked him whether the 
United States would recognize the new government of France. 
The Secretary assumed a very solemn tone and attitude, saying, 
" Why not 1 The United States has recognized the Bourbons, 
the French Eepublic, the Directory, the Council of Five Hun- 
dred, the First Consul, the Emperor, Louis XYIIL, Charles X., 
Louis PhilipiDc, the — " "Enough! Enough!" cried the 
Minister, perfectly satisfied by such a formidable citation of 
consistent precedents. 

Mr. Webster lived in Somerset Street, and also at the corner 
of High and Summer Streets, during the different periods of 
his residence in Boston. The house in Somerset Street is 
on the east side, is numbered tliirty-seven, and is still standing. 
It was occupied successively by Uriah Cotting, Daniel Web- 
ster, Abbott Lawrence, and Rev. Ephraini Peabody of King's 
Chapel. Webster's residence in High Street is marked by a 
splendid block of stores, aptly styled "Webster Buildings." 
Here he resided at the time of Lafoyette's visit in 1825, and 
received the distinguished Frenchman on the evening of the 
1 7th of June. 

Mr. W(il)ster was a genuine lover of nature and of field 
sports, and Avas a good shot. He delighted in his farm at 
Marshtield, and in his well-fed cattle. Gray's Elegy was his 
favorite poem, and he was accustomed to repeat it with great 
feeling and emphasis. Of his two sons, Edward died in 
^Mexico, a Major of the ^Massachusetts Volunteers ; Fletcher, 
Colonel of tlie Twelfth Massachusetts Volunteers in the AVar of 
the Rebellion, was killed near Bull Run in 1862. 



king's ClIArEL AXD THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 47 

AVitli two such distingiiislied liglits of the profession as 
Otis and Webster before them, it is no wonder the old corner 
retains its magnetism for tlie disciples of Sir William Black- 
stone. 

Having now passed down one side of ancient " Treamount " 
Street, we will repair to the corner of Howard Street, and 
go up the other side, following the practice of the fathers 
of the town, who numbered the streets consecutively down 
on one side and up the other. This is still the custom in 
London, and was doubtless imported with many other old- 
country usages. 

Old "Treamount Street" began in 1708, at the extreme cor- 
ner of Court Street and Tremont Eow, as they now are, and 
extended around the base of what was first called Cotton Hill 
(so called as late as 1733), from the residence of Rev. John 
Cotton ; subsequently Pemberton Hill, from James Pemberton, 
a later resident at the north end of what is now Pemberton 
Square. It was at first merely called a highway, like the other 
principal avenues, received very early the name of street, and 
was at the northerly part caUed Sudbury Lane, 1702. It ter- 
minated at Beacon Street. Pemberton Hill, a spur of Beacon, 
now marks a level of about eighty feet below the summit of 
the original hill, it having been cut doA^Ti in 1835. 

On the brow of the hill, later the residence of Gardiner 
Greene, was the mansion of Governor Endicott, that uncom- 
promising Puritan who, in 1629, sent the obnoxious Episcopa- 
lians home to England, and afterwards cut out the cross from 
the King's standard because it "savored of popery." John 
Endicott was sent to America by the jNlassachusetts Company, 
in England, of which ^lathew Cradock was governor, as their 
agent, and Avas governor of the colony which settled at Salem 
in 1628. He was the successor of Winthrop, as governor, in 
1644, and again in 1649, and removed to Boston in the former 
year. Endicott filled a number of important offices ; was ap- 
pointed Sergeant Major-General in 1645, and in 1652 estab- 
lished a mint, which, though without legal authority, contiiuied 
to supply a currency for more than tliirty years. Governor 



48 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 




ENDICOTT CUTTING OLT THE CROSS. 



Endicott opposed the crusade of Eev. John Cotton against the 
"wearing of veils by ladies, and had a warm personal discussion 

with that eminent divine. His 
portrait is more hke a cardinal of 
Eichelieu's time than a Puritan 
soldier. His head is covered by a 
close-litting velvet skull-cap, from 
which the curling iron-gray hair 
is escaping down his shoulders ; a 
broad linen collar, fastened at the 
throat with cord and tassel, fiills 
upon his breast, while his small 
white right hand is grasping a 
gauntlet richly embroidered. En- 
dicott's forehead is massive, his 
nose large and prominent ; but a 
gray mustache which decorates his upper lip ellectually con- 
ceals the expression of his mouth, while a long imperial of the 
French fashion hides a portion of the chin. His whole coun- 
tenance, however, indicates strength, resolution, and courage. 
The nmtilation of the flag was not an act of bravado at a safe 
distance from punishment, but of conscience ; and Ins portrait 
sliows us that, having once formed a conviction, he would pur- 
sue it regardless of consequences. 

Captain Cyprian Southack had a comfortable estate of two 
acres, in 1702, lying on the northerly and easterly slope of the 
hill. Howard Street, which was first named Southack's Court 
I'or liiin, subsequently Howard Street, from John Howard the 
philanthropist, ran through his lands. Captain Southack served 
under the famous Colonel Benjamin Church in an expedition 
against the French and Indians in 1704, in which he com- 
manded a small vessel, called the Province Snow, of fourteen 
guns. When Admiral Sir H. AValker arrived in Boston in 
1711, with a fleet and five thousand men destined to act against 
the French in Canada, he took up his residence with Southack 
in Tremont Street. The captain was to lead the van of the 
expedition. 



king's chapel and the neighborhood. 49 

In 1717 the pirate ship AVliidah, commanded by the noto- 
rious Samuel Bellamy, was wrecked on tlie rocks of that part 
of Eastliam, now WellHeet. The council despatched Captain 
Southack to tlie scene of the disaster. His powers are indi- 
cated by the following original document : — 

" By virtue of power to m^, given by his Excellency Sand. Shute, 
Esip, CJovt., and the Admiral, bearing date April 3()tli, 1717, to 
seize what goods, merchandise, or effects have or may be found or 
taken from the Pirate shij) wreck at Cape Codd, and those taken 
up by Joseph Done, Esq., in carting and bringing in to me the sub- 
scriber for his Majesty's service at Mr. Wm. Brown's at Eastham. 

"Cyprian Southack, 
"Eastham, May 6, 1717." 

Bellamy's ship was purposely run on shore by the captain of 
a small vessel he had captured the day before. The captain 
was to have received his vessel from the pirate in return for 
piloting him into Cape Cod harbor, but, distrusting the good 
faith of his captor, run his own vessel so near the rocks that 
the large ship of the pirate was wrecked in attempting to follow 
her. A storm arose, and the rest of the pirate fleet, thrown 
into confusion, shared the ftite of their commander. Captain 
Southack buried one hundred and two bodies. A few that 
escaped the wreck were brought to Boston and executed. For 
a long time — as late as 1794 — copper coins of William and 
Mary, and pieces of silver, called cob money, were picked up 
near the scene of the wreck. The violence of the sea moved 
the sands upon the outer bar, so that the iron caboose of the 
vessel was visible at low ebb.* 

Thefxlore Lyman, senior, father of the mayor of that name, 
owned and occupied a mansion on the corner of Howard and 
Treraont Streets in 1785. A beautiful green lawn extended 
in front of his residence. These charming oases in the midst 
of the desert of ])rick walls have long ceased to exist except in 
the public squares. This lot was also intended to have been 
used by the Brattle Street Church Society when they rebuilt 
in 1772 - 73 ; but Governor Hancock, by the present of a bell, 

* Massachusetts Historical CoUectious, 

3 D 



60 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

induced tliem to rebuild on the old site. Tliis location was 
also occupied by Holland's Coffee House, afterwards the Pern- 
berton House, destroyed Ijy fire in 1854. 

Passing the estate of John Jekyll, Esq., one of the earliest 
collectors of the port of Boston, 1707, and a great friend of his 
neighbors the Faneuils, we come to that of Kev. John Cotton, 
the sjiiritual father of Boston. John Cotton, as stated in our 
introductory chapter, was vicar of St. Botolph's Church in Bos- 
ton, England, but inclined to the Puritan form of worship. 
Cited to appear before the notorious Archbishop Laud for 
omitting to kneel at the sacrament, he fled to America, and 
arrived in Boston in 1633, three years after the settlement. 
Here he became a colleague of tlie lie v. John Wilson in the 
pastorate of tlie First Church. He was a man of great learning, 
well acquainteil with Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, and published 
many sermons and controversial works. He died from the 
effects of exposure in crossing the Cambridge ferry, and has 
a memorial erected to his memory in his old church of St. 
Botolph's, England, through the liberality of Edward Everett 
and other Bostonians. 

The house of Mr. Cotton stood a little south of the entrance 
to Pemberton S(|uare, near the street, and was standing about 
fifty years ago. It was then considered the oldest in Boston, 
and the back part, which remained unaltered, had tlie small 
diamond panes of glass set in lead. His ample estate extended 
back over the hill as far as Dr. Kirk's Church in Asliburton 
Place, and embraced all the central portion of what is now 
Pemberton Square. 

This house had a still more distinguished tenant in Henry 
Vane the younger, who resided in it during his stay of two 
years in Boston, making some additions to the building for his 
own greater comfort. Sir Harry, whose eventful history is 
familiar, was received with great respect by Winthrop and 
the people of the town, on his arrival in 1G35. His father, 
Sir Henry, was Secretary of State and Treasurer of the House- 
hold under James I. and Charles I. Alienated from the 
Church of England, young Harry Vane refused to take the 



king's chapel and the neighborhood. 51 

oath of allegiance, and became a Kepublican and a l^uritan. 
He was only twenty-four when chosen governor of Massaclni- 
setts Colony. During his administration the religious contro- 
versy between tlie congregation and the new sect of Faniilists, 
of which -Anne Hutchinson was the acknowledged exponent, 
broke out. Sir Harry, opposed by Winthrop, was defeated at 
a second election of governor, but was immediately chosen a 
representative from the town to the General Court. lieturning 
to England, in 1G37, he was elected to Parliament and knighted 
in 1G40. He is said to have presented the bill of attainder 
against the Earl of Strafford. Disliking Cromwell's dissolution 
of tlie Long Parliament, Vane withdrew from public alfairs 
until 1649, when he became member of the Council of State, 
witli almost exclusive control of naval and foreign affairs of 
the Commonwealth. At the restoration of Charles II. he was 
thrown into the Tower, and executed on Tower Hill, Lon- 
don, June 14, 1G02. His bearing at the place of execution 
was manly and dignified, and he has been descril)ed by Eorster 
as one of the gxeatest and purest men that ever walked the 

earth : — 

"Vane, young in years, but in sage counsel old, 

Than whom a better senator ne'er held 
The helm of Rome, when gowns, not arms, repelled 

The fierce Ejjirot and th' Afric bold, 
Whether to settle peace, or to unfold 

The drift of hollow states hard to be spelled ; 
Then to advise how war may, best uphehl, 

Move by her two main nerves, iron and gold, 
In all her e(|uipage ; besides, to know 

Both spiritual jjower and civil, wliat each means. 
What severs each, — thou hast learned what few have done, 

The bounds of either sword to thee we owe ; 
Tlierefore on thy fimi hand Religion leans 

In peace, and reckons thee her eldest son. " 

Judge Samuel Sewall, Chief Justice of tlie colony, in whose 
family the estates of Cotton and Bellingham became united, 
lived here in 1C89. He was repeatedly applied to to sell a 
piece of his land to the Episcopalians to build a church upon, 
but refused. He marricul a daughter of John Hull, the cele- 
brated mint-master, w^itli whom he got, at diilerent tim(^s, a 



52 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

snug portion of Master Hull's estate. He was one of the judges 
during the witchcraft trials of 1692, but afterwards expressed 
contrition for his share in that wretched business. Stoughton, 
on the contrary, on one occasion, indignant at the governor's 
reprieve of some of the victims, left the court exclaiming, " We 
were in a way to have cleared the land of these. Who is it 
obstructs the course of justice I know not. The Lord be mer- 
ciful to the country ! " 

Judge Sewall was a considerable proprietor, owning a large 
estate on Beacon Hill, known in his time as Sewall's Elm 
Pasture. Through this were laid out anciently Coventry, 
Sewall, and Bishop-Stoke Street, the latter named from his 
English birthplace. The judge left a diary, now in posses- 
sion of the Historical Society, containing much contemporary 
history. He attended the Old South, and related to Rev. 
Dr. Prince the story of Johnson's settlement and burial in 
Boston. 

Patrick Jeffrey, who married Madam Haley, sister of the 
celebrated John Wilkes of the North Briton, became a subse- 
quent possessor of the Cotton estate. Somerset Street, named 
from John Bowers of Somerset, Mass., crosses the Jeffrey or 
Cotton estate, and the former conveyed to the town, in 1801, 
so much of that street as passed through his property. 

Another proprietor of the Cotton estate was Gardiner Greene, 
well remembered as one of the wealthiest citizens of Boston. 
By purchase of his neighbors, Mr. Greene became possessed of 
the larger portion of Pemberton Hill, which he greatly beauti- 
fied and improved. The hill was terraced, and ^Ir. Greene's 
mansion — which, though substantial, had no special marks of 
elegance — was reached by long flights of steps. Mr. Greene 
is said to have owned the only greenhouse then existing in 
Boston, and his grounds, adorned by nature and art, made alto- 
gether the finest private residence in the town. 

INIr. Greene's third wife was a sister of Lord Lyndhurst, son 
of the celebrated painter, Copley, and a Bostonian, who be- 
came a peer of the i-ealm and Lord Chancellor of Great Brit- 
ain. He was called the "Nestor of the House of Lords," 



king's chapel and the neighborhood. 53 

and was noted for liis dry caustic humor. Once, when Lord 
Brougham, speaking of tlie salary attached to a certain appoint- 
ment, said it was all moonshine, Lyndhurst, in his waggish way 
remarked, " Maybe so, my Lord Harry ; but I have a con- 
founded strong notion that, moonsliine though it be, you would 
like to see the first quarter of it." 

Gardiner Greene's residence was occupied in 1775 by a noble 
tenant, Percy, afterwards Earl of Northumberland, gallant, 
chivalrous, and brave, — 

" Wlio, when a younger son, 
Fought lor King George at Lexington, 
A major of dragoons." 

Percy it was who saved the royal troops from destruction at 
Lexington, on the ever memorable 19th of April, 1775. He 
seems to have changed his quarters quite often, for, about the 
time of the affair at Lexington, he was ordered by General 
Gage to take possession of the Hancock house on Beacon 
Street. He also resided some time with Mrs. Sheaffe, widow 
of the collector, in Essex Street. We shall call on him at his 
several habitations. 

Richard Bellingham, Esq., Governor of Massachusetts in 
1635, in 1641, and again in 1654, and from 1666, after the 
death of Endicott, until his own decease in 1672, was the next 
neighbor of Cotton. Anne Hibbins, who married William Hib- 
bins, an early settler of Boston, for many years in the service 
of the Colony, was a relative of Governor BelHngham. This 
unfortunate woman, denounced for witchcraft, was executed in 
1656, when an accusation was equivalent to condemnation, 
and forfeited her life to the superstitious bigotry of the period. 
Governor Bellingham served the colony as governor and dep- 
uty for twenty-three years ; was ordered by Charles II. to 
England with other obnoxious persons, but ])ru(U'iitly declined 
going, by advice of the General Court. Bellingham, whose 
intellect was said to have been impaired, was an unrelenting 
persecutor of the Quakers. His house stood on the spot after- 
wards occupied by the residence of Lieutenant-G()V(M-nor Pliil- 
lips, opposite the north end of the Chapel Burying-Ground, 



54 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

and about midway from the entrance to Pemberton Square to 
Beacon Street. 

Tlie Bellingham estate was also the property of Peter 
Paneuil, who received it from Andrew, his uncle, in 1737. 
The house, a fine old stone mansion, stood on the hillside some 
distance back from the street. Opening into the cellar was 
a curious cylindrical brick vault, resembling in shape a wine- 
cask, and used as a wine-cellar by the more modern occupants. 
It was about fifteen feet in diameter by twenty-five feet long ; 
'and as it formed no part of the original cellar, which was 
amply sufficient for ordinary purposes, Avas considered to have 
been a place of concealment for smuggled goods. 

The following description of the Faneuil house is from 
Miss Quincy's Memoir : " The deep court-yard, ornamented by 
flowers and shrubs, was divided into an upper and lower plat- 
form by a high glacis, surmounted by a richly wrought iron 
railing decorated with gilt balls. The edifice was of brick, 
painted white ; and over the entrance door was a semicircular 
balcony. The terraces which rose from the paved court behind 
the house were supported by massy walls of hewn granite, and 
were ascended by flights of steps of the same material. A 
grasshopper yet glittered on a summer-house which com- 
manded a view only second to that from Beacon Hill." 

Such was the mansion at the time of its occupancy by Gov- 
ernor Phillips. Andrew Faneuil erected on this estate the first 
hothouse in New England. The deed to him describes the 
mansion as " a stone house." 

The Faneuils were French Huguenots from La Eochelle, 
ever memorable from its siege and gallant defence, and came to 
America after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. The 
name is erroneously inscribed "Funel" on the stone which covers 
the remains of the Faneuils in the Granary Burying-Ground. 
Peter Faneuil is best known as the munificent donor of Fan- 
euil Hall to the town of Boston. He was born at New 
Eochelle, near New York, in 1700 ; was the wealthiest Bos- 
tonian of his day, and after having lived only forty-two 
years, died suddenly of dropsy in 1742. Like many of liis 



KINGS CHArEL AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. bi) 

contemporaries, lie was a slaveholder, and there is a sort of 
poetic justice in the fact that the first steps for the emancipa- 
tion of slaves in Boston were taken in Faneuil Hall. 

Peter Faneuil lived in a style worthy his position as a prince 
among merchants. He owned a chariot and coach, with 
English horses, for state occasions, and a two and four wheeled 
chaise for ordinary purposes. He had five negroes, and four- 
teen hundred ounces of plate, among which is enumerated 
"a large handsome chamber-pot." His cellar was bursting 
with good wine, arrack, beer, Cheshire and Gloucester cheeses, 
— what wonder his decease was sudden ! — and he died owner 
of eight buildings in Cornhill and King Street, with many 
vessels and parts of vessels. 

To retrograde a little, next north of Peter Faneuil's once 
dAvelt Rev. John Davenport, who came over to Boston in 
1637. He was one of the founders of New Haven, Connecti- 
cut. "When the Regicides, as Charles I.'s judges Gofi'e and 
Whalley were styled, were forced to live in concealment, 
Davenport took them into his own house. Returning to Bos- 
ton he became, in 16G8, pastor of the First Church, but died 
in 1G70, after holding his charge but a short time, and lies in 
the " Old Burial-Place," opposite where he once lived. The 
estate of Rev. John Davenport remained for nearly a century 
the property of the First Church, and was occupied by Fox- 
croft, Clarke, and others. 

Lieutenant-Governor William Phillips, by birth a Bostonian, 
became the proprietor of the Faneuil mansion and estate in 
1791, which was confiscated in 1783 by the Commonwealth. 
Governor Phillips also acquired the Davenport estate in 1805, 
which gave him a magnificent homestead, well worthy one of 
the solid men of Boston. He was in ofiice from 1812 to 1823. 
INIr. Phillips made a most liberal use of the fortune he inherited, 
was a great benefactor of the Massachusetts General Hos- 
pital during his life, and made valuable bequests to Phillips 
Academy, Andover Theological Seminary, and other institu- 
tions. 

Rev. John Oxenbridge, another pastor of the First Church, 



56 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

lived on the site of the Pavilion in 1G71. A former occu- 
pant was Colonel Samuel Shrimpton, who at one time owned 
Noddle's Island (East Boston), and gave his name to what is 
now Exchange Street, once Shrimpton's Lane. Rev. Jolin 
Oxenbridge was educated at Oxford and also at Cambridge, 
was a popular preacher and a fluent writer. Dying in 1674, 
he was interred, like his predecessor DavenjDort, in the Old 
Burying-Place opposite. George Cradock, Collector of Boston, 
lived here in 1728. 

We have now reached the corner of Beacon Street, wliich 
was first styled the lane leading to the Almshouse, a rather 
humble designation for the most aristocratic street of Boston. 
The Albion corner was once occupied by James Penn, ruling 
elder of the First Church, and a citizen of note. It became 
later the estate of Samuel Eliot, father of Mayor Eliot, noted 
for his reforms in the Eire Department. Both the Albion site 
and that of the block of houses west of it were occupied by Mr. 
Eliot's mansion-house and gardens. He was a true gentleman 
of the old school, wedded to the customs of a past generation. 
In the coldest weather he appeared in his customary cocked 
hat, small clothes, and ruffled shirt bosom, without cloak or 
overcoat. He was a dealer in dry goods at the west corner of 
Wilson's Lane, in Dock Square. 

From the array of honorable names presented, Tremont Row 
was once entitled to be called the Rotten Row of Boston. En- 
dicott. Vane, Bellingham, governors of the Colony ; Phillips, 
lieutenant-governor of the State ; and the eminent divines Cot- 
ton, Davenport, and Oxenbridge, all found a residence here. 

We continue our perambulations through School Street, 
wliich, receiving its name from the old Latin School, was 
called Latin School Street. Its limits were the same as now, 
and it was first called the lane leading to Centry Hill. It was 
laid out in 1640. 

Below the old King's Chapel stood the Latin School, whose 
situation and removal to the opposite side of the street has 
already been described. It originated in 1634, and Philemon 
Pormont was " intreated to become schoolmaster for the teaching 



king's chapel and the neighborhood. 57 

and nourteiing of children with vs." Tliis was the beginning of 
that educational system in which Boston takes so just a pride. 
The grounds extended down the street nearly to the Franklin 
statue. The building itself was of one story, large enough to 
accommodate a hundred scholars. Franklin went to the Latin 
School one year, entering in 1714, at the age of eight years; 
his statue is, therefore, becomingly placed near his alma mater. 
John Hancock also attended the school, entering in 1745 ; his 
much-admired and striking autograph was doubtless acquired 
on its hard benches. Eobert Treat Paine, the elder, Lieutenant- 
Governor Gushing, James Bow^loin, Gotton ]\Iather, Samuel 
Adams, Sir AVilliam Pepperell, and a host of names famous in 
our history, prepared here for future high stations. 

The early masters were men of erudition and high consider- 
ation in the town. Ezekiel Gheever ranks at the head of the 
old pedagogues. He was one of the founders of Xew Haven, 
and a teacher for seventy years at Kew Haven, Ipswich, Gharles- 
town, and Boston. 

John Lovell presided over the school, as usher and principal, 
from 1717 until 1775, when the siege put an end to it for a 
time. He decamped with the Royalists in 1776. He delivered 
the first public address in Faneuil Hall on the death of its 
founder. Lovell's house adjoined the new school, and after the 
evacuation General Gage's coach and phaeton, with harness 
entire, were found there. 

Of the school on the opposite side of the street, which, till 
1844, stood on the site of the Parker House, many distinguished 
Bostonians have been pupils, among whom Harrison Gray Otis, 
Rev. Dr. Jenks, R. G. Winthrop, Gharles Sumner, and the 
sculptor Greenough are conspicuous. 

The Gentre Writing School was built in 1 790, on the north 
side of School Street. It was a two-story wooden Iniilding, and 
was pulled down in 1812, as it then obstructed the front of the 
new Gourt House. This was the school of ]\ Lister James Gar- 
ter. The pupils were accommodated ])y an enlargement of the 
Latin vSchool. 

The statue in bronze of Benjamin Franklin, in the grounds 
3* 



58 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

of the City Hall, is by Richard S. Greenough, and was cast hy 
the Ames Manufacturing Company at ChicojDee, Mass. It is 
eight feet high, and stands on a pedestal of granite, capped 
with a block of verd antique marble. Four bas-reliefs represent 
different periods of Franklin's career. It was publicly inaugu- 
rated September 17, 185G. 

When Franklin worked in the printing-office of Mr. Watts, 
Little Wild Street, London, he was called by his fellow-work- 
men the " Water American," because he refused to drink any- 
thing else, while they drank their five pints of beer apiece dady. 
When he went to England afterwards, as agent for Massachu- 
setts, he went into this office, and going up to a particular 
press (now in this country), said to the two workmen, " Come, 
my friends, we will drink together. It is now forty years since 
I worked like you at this press, a journeyman printer." 

Franklin's celebrated toast at Versailles will not lose by repe- 
tition. At the conclusion of the war he, with the English 
Ambassador, was dining with the French Minister Vergennes ; 
a toast from each was called for. The British minister began 
with, " George III., who, like the sun in its meridian, spreads 
a lustre throughout and enlightens the world." The French 
ambassador followed with, " Louis XVI., who, like the moon, 
sheds its mild and benignant rays on and illumines the 
world." Our American Franklin then gave, " George Wash- 
ington, commander of the American armies, who, like Joshua 
of old, commanded the sun and moon to stand still, and they 
obeyed him." 

The City Hall stands on ground sold to the town by Thomas 
Scotto in 1645. The foundation of the present building was 
laid in 1862 witli appropriate ceremonies. It is built of Con- 
cord granite, and was designed by Messrs. Bryant and Gilman. 
The first Town House was erected between 1657-59, at the 
head of State Street, of wood, where the Old State House now 
stands. A legacy had been left by Captain Robert Keayne, 
in 1656, for this purpose, which was supplemented by sub- 
scriptions from Governors Endicott, Bellingham, and others. 
This building was consumed in the fire of 1711 ; another, built 



KING S CHAPEL AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 



o9 



of brick in 1712, was burnt in 1747, with the early books, 
records, and valuable papers. In 1748 the Town House was 
rebuilt. Faneuil Hall was also used as a Town House for 
nearly eiglity years, and the first city government was organized 
there. In 1830 the city government removed to the Old State 




THE OLD COURT HOUSE AND CITY HALL. 



House, which Avas, on September 17, dedicated as the City 
Hall. In 1840 the old County Court House, on the present 
site, was remodelled for a City Hall, and continued to be so 
iintil the erection of the present building and dedication in 
1865. 

Our view of the Old Court House is taken from School Street, 
and shows how the buikling and surroundings appeared in 
1812. In the left foreground is Barristers* Hall, and to the 
ri"ht the wall and enclosure of Dr. Samuel Clarke's house is 



seen. 



The County Court House, referred to as occupying this site, 
was built in 1810, of granite. The main building was octago- 
nal, with wings at each side. It was one hundred and forty 
feet long, and was occupietl by the offices of Probate, Registry 
of Deeds, and the County Courts. This building was called 
Johnson Hall, in honor of Isaac Johnson, tradition having 



60 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

ascribed to this spot the location of his house, — a name which 
does not seem to have been generally adopted. 

Next the county property, in 1760, once lived one of the 
greatest of the ante-Revolutionary patriots, James Otis, " whose 
electric eloquence was like the ethereal flash that quenched its 
fire." Otis came to Boston when he was twenty-five, in 1750, 
and in 1761 made the famous speech against the "Writs of 
Assistance." Some severe strictures which he made upon the 
officers of customs resulted in an attack on him at the British 
Coffee House in King Street, by John Robinson, a commis- 
sioner of customs, and others. Otis was severely injured, and 
received a deep cut on the head, which ultimately contributed 
to cause his insanity. As an instance of the magnanimity of 
Otis, he refused the damages awarded him by the court, upon 
receiving an apology from his assailant. In 1769 Otis was 
causing the greatest concern to his friends for the increasing 
symptoms he gave of coming mental aberration. John Adams 
says of him : " I fear, I tremble, I mourn for the man and his 
country ; many others mourn over him with tears in their 
eyes." Otis withdrew to the country in 1770, and, after a 
brief lucid period, during which he resumed practice in Bos- 
ton, he was killed at Andover in May, 1783, by a stroke of 
lightning, at the age of fifty-eight. 

Next the residence of Otis, where Niles's Block now is, was 
the house of Jean Paul Mascarene, a French Huguenot of Lan- 
guedoc. He went to England and entered the army, coming 
in 1711 to Nova Scotia, of which he became Lieutenant- 
Governor, and ultimately rose to the rank of Major-General. 
He died in Boston in 1760. The house was of two stories, 
of brick, and painted white. The Mascarene family were loyal- 
ists, and retired to Nova Scotia when the Revolution began. 

Dr. John Warren, th^ youngest brother of Joseph Warren, 
killed at Bunker Hill, next occupied the premises. The old 
house and gardens are still remembered by many. Dr. Warren 
served in the American army as hospital surgeon, and was long 
the most eminent surgeon in New England. On the day of 
Bunker Hill, the anxiety of the doctor for his brother led him 



king's CILVrEL AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. Gl 

to attempt to pass a giuinl, who gave him a bayonet wound, the 
mark of which lie carried to liis grave. Dr. Warren was the 
father of Dr. John C. AVarren, scarcely less eminent in his pro- 
fessicm than his father. The old doctor died in 1815, and was 
buried from King's Chapel, Dr. James Jackson delivering the 
eulogy. Both Joseph and John Warren were born in the old 
wooden house on Warren Street, in what was formerly Rox- 
bury. The original mansion, being ruinous, was rebuilt on 
the site of the old in 184G, partly of the old materials, by Dr. 
John C. Warren. Many a pilgrimage is paid to the birthplace 
of the hero who placed himself, against the advice of friends, 
in the post of honor and of danger. 

The Cromwell's Head, a famous tavern, was on the spot 
where the building numbered 19 now stands, which is to-day, 
as of yore, devoted to the replenishing of the inner man. It 
was kept by Anthony Brackett in 1760, by his widow from 
1764: to 1768; and later by Joshua Brackett. Its repute was 
good, for we find the Marquis Chastellux alighting there in 
1782, before paying his respects to M. de Vaudreuil, com- 
mander of the French fleet that was to convey away Ilocham- 
beau's army. 

The sign of this hostelry was the' effigy of the Lord Protector 
Cromwell, and it is said hung so low that all who passed were 
compelled to make an involuntary reverence. The royal officers 
would not allow it to remain ; it was too suggestive of the 
overthrow of kingly authority ; but Brackett, in whose eyes 
this circumstance gave it additional value, replaced it after the 
evacuation. j\Iine host Brackett's carte is surmounted by a 
facsimile of the sign, from a plate by Paul Revere, and shows 
that besides board, lodging and eating, one might have wine, 
punch, porter, and liquor, with due care for his beast, for 
certain pounds, shillings, and pence. Brackett's, no doubt, 
commanded the patronage of his neighbors we liave been 
noting. Rare Ben Jonson's lines might have been a trunq^et- 
call to his votaries, — 

" Wine is tlie word that glads the heart of man, 
And mine 's tlie liouse of wine. Scick says my bush, 
Be merry and drink sherry, that 's my posie." 



62 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



But mine host of Croin well's Head had in 1756 a more dis- 
tinguished guest, for in that year Lieutenant-Colonel Washing- 
ton visited Boston accompanied by Captain George Mercer of 
Virginia and Captain Stewart. He came to refer a question of 
command to General Shirley who had succeeded Braddock in 
the military control of the colonies. This was after the disas- 
trous campaign that ended in Braddock's defeat. Washington's 
next visit was with the commission of the Continental Congress 
as commander-in-chief. 

The corner familiarly known as the " Old Corner Book- 
Store," where have gathered the disciples of black-letter and 




THE OLD CORNER BOOKSTORE, 



red-line for so many years, is probably the oldest brick build- 
ing standing in Boston. It bears the date of 1712, and its 
erection is supposed to have occurred soon after the great fire 
of 1711. Shurtleff has given its various occupants in detail, 
but aside from its literary associations the corner has only a 
single historical incident. 

Anne Hutchinson, who fills a chapter in the history of 
Boston commemorative of the ecclesiastical tyranny of its 



KlXCr'S CIIArEL AND THE NEir.IIBOr.IIOOD. Go 

founders, lived here about 1G34. She was the leader of the 
sect of Antinomians, and daughter of Kev. Francis Marbury of 
London, — an ancestor of Governor Thomas Hutchinson, and 
rector of several London parishes. Her mother was great 
aunt of John Dryden tlie poet. She was a woman of con- 
summate ability and address, for we learn that liev. John 
Cotton was ensnared by her, while AVinthrop wavered. The 
latter, however, became her bitter enemy, and pursued her with 
great vindictiveness. For a time she had all Boston by the 
ears, and even public business halted. 

Islebius, a German, appears to have founded the sect of 
Antinomians about 1600. It held the "law of Closes to be 
unprofitable, and that there is no sin in children." " ]Mistris 
Hutchison," as Governor Winthrop calls her, after a two days' 
trial was banished in 1638, and went to Rhode Island, the 
haven of religious refugees. Going afterwards to Xew York, 
slie fell a victim to an Indian foray. Her l\»llowers in Boston, 
a numerous faction, were disarmed. Winthrop says " she was 
a woman of haughty and fierce carriage, a nimble wit and 
active spirit, a very voluble tongue, more bold than a man, 
though in understanding and judgment inferior to many 
women." 

At the conclusion of jSIrs. Hutchinson's trial she was 
addressed by Governor Winthrop as folloAvs : — 

" Mrs. Hutchinson ! the sentence of the court you hear is, 
that you are banished from out of our jurisdiction, as being a 
woman not fit for our society, and are to be imprisoned 'til 
the court shall send you away." 

Mrs. H. " I desire to know wherefore I am banished." 

Winthrop. " Say no more ; the court know wherefore, and 
is satisfied." 

Just before you come to the Universalist Church, ascending 
School Street towards Tremont, was the little church of the 
French Huguenots of Boston. This was the church of the Fan- 
euils, Baudoins, Boutineaus, Sigourneys, and Johonnots ; their 
names are not quite extinct among us, although the ortln >gra]ihy 
may be changed in some instances. The church was built of 



64 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

brick, about 1704, was very small, and for a long time its 
erection was opposed by the town. Before building, the 
French occupied one of the school-houses. Queen Anne 
presented a large folio Bible to this church, which afterwards 
fell into the possession of Mather Byles ; and Andrew Faneuil 
gave in his will three pieces of plate for communion and 
baptism, besides his warehouse in King Street. Pierre Daille 
was the first minister, deceased in 1715, and was succeeded by 
Le Mercier. A singular incident led to the discovery of Daille's 
gravestone. While laborers were excavating a cellar on the 
Emmons estate on Pleasant Street they suddenly uncovered 
the stone which bore the following inscription : — 

Here lyes y' body of y* 
Reverend Mr, Peter 
Daille minister of y* 
French church in 
Boston died the 
21 of May 1715 
In the 67 year 
Of his age. 

After the dissolution of the society, the house of the French 
Church fell into the hands of the Eleventh Congregational So- 
ciety, which arose during the excitement caused by the coming 
of Whitefield. Mr. Crosswell was the pastor, dying in 1785, 
when the house passed to the Roman Catholics. Mass was 
first celebrated in the church in November, 1788. It was 
removed in 1802. 

The Second Universalist Church stands next west of the 
French Church site, and like it is soon to disappear from the 
historic street. It was erected in 1817, after preliminary 
action in the preceding year by a meeting held at the Green 
Dragon Tavern. It was much enlarged and improveci in 1837, 
and entirely remodelled in 1851. Eev. Hosea Ballon was 
the first pastor. Rev. E. H. Chapin preached here from 
1846 to 1848, when he removed to New York, where he is still 
one of the most eloquent divines of the metropolis. 

Province Street received its name in 1833, from its vicinity 
to the Province House. Before that time it was Governor's Al- 



king's chapel and the neighborhood. Go 

ley. Chapman Place was Cooke's Court, from Elislia Cooke, a 
resident of colonial times, who was agent with Increase Mather 
in England to obtain a new charter for the colony. The house 
of Elisha Cooke becomes distinguished as the residence of Gov- 
ernor Burnet until the Province House could be made ready. 
The house was a two-story brick, with dormer windows, and 
faced the east. In front was a small court-yard. 

Loring, in the " Hundred Boston Orators," says : " The res- 
idence of James Lovell during the Eevolution was on the 
estate where Chapman Hall is now located, and his family wit- 
nessed, on the house-top, the burning of Charlestown during 
the battle of Bunker Hill. While Mr. Lovell was impris- 
oned in the Boston jail, in Queen Street, in consequence of 
General Howe having discovered a prohibited correspondence, 
proving his adherence to the Eevolutionary cause, his devoted 
wife was daily accustomed to convey his food to the prison 
door." Chapman Hall was in Chapman Place, and is now suc- 
ceeded by the Parker House. 

James was a son of that Master Lovell of whom mention 
has been made. He had been usher of that school, and master of 
what is now the Eliot School. He was among the prominent 
Revolutionary patriots, and had first been imprisoned and finally 
carried to Halifax on the evacuation. After being exchanged 
in 1776, Master Lovell became a member of the Continental 
Congress ; was receiver of taxes in 1784, and after being Col- 
lector of the port, was for a long time Naval Officer. His son 
married Helen, one of Mr. Sheaffe's handsome daughters. 

Besides having replaced the Latin School, tlie Parker House 
also occupies the ground wliere there long remained an old brick 
mansion, erected early in the last century by Jacob Wendell. 
He was a wealthy merchant, and colonel of the Boston Regi- 
ment in 1745 ; afterwards a councillor, and a director in the 
first banking institution in the province. His son Oliver, also 
a leading Bostonian, was the grandfather of Oliver Wendell 
Holmes, the only "autocrat" who has ever flourished in 
Boston. 

Oliver WendeU was, like his flither, a leading merchant of 



66 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 

Boston. He was a selectman during tlie siege, and joined in 
the congratulatory address to Washington when it was termi- 
nated by the evacuation. The following original document 
shows us that Wendell was trusted by the commander-in-chief: — 

The United States of America to the Subscribers Dr. 

To one month's services by Land and Sea, from March, 25th 1776, 
to April 25th, Strictly watching the communication from the Town 
of Boston to the British fleet Laying in Nantasket Eoad in Order 
to apprehend and seize any British Spies who might have Concealed 
themselves in the Town in order to Carry Intelligence to our Enemies 
of the Proceedings of the American Troops then in the Town of 
Boston, by Order of Major Generall Greene. 
Thii-ty Days Each man at 12/ p Day is J 108. — 

Benj Wheeler 
Benj^ Barnard 
Andrew Symmes Jr 
Joshua Bentley 
John Champney 
Thomas Tileston 



Rec the within Contents in full 



The foUowinf? is indorsed on the back : ■ 



Oliver Wendell 



Pay unto Oliver Wendal Esquire one hundred eight pounds 
Lawful money for the use of the signers of the within account, he 
being employed by Major General Greene by my order to engage a 
number of persons for the within service in March 1776 when the 
Enemy evacuated Boston. 

Given under my hand at 

Camp Fredericksburg Novem 12 1778 
Hon Major ) G. Washington 

Genl. Gates ) 

To Ebenezer Hancock Esq Paymaster Genl 

Eastern Department 
Sir, — Pay the above sum of one hundred and eight pounds Law- 
ful money to Oliver Wendell Esq m consequence of the above order 
for which this with his receipt shall be your sufficient Warrant By 
the Generals command Horatio Gates 

John Armstrong Jr 

Aid de Camp Head Quarters 25th November 1778 

Joseph Green, beyond comparison the keenest wit of his 



king's chapel and the neighborhood. 67 

time, lived in School Street. He was a merchant, — Dr. Byles 

terms him a distiller, — and accunmlated a handsome property. 

He was the general satirist, epic, and epitaph writer of his day, 

and wielded a trenchant pen, of which none stood more in awe 

than Governor Belcher. His epitaph on the countryman whose 

forte was raking hay, in which he excelled all hut his employer, 

is as follows : — 

" He coiild rake hay ; none could rake faster. 
Except that raking dog his master." 

Green, who was well advanced in life when the Eevolutionary 
struggle begun, removed to England, where he engaged in busi- 
ness, residing in the parish of St. Andrew, Holborn, London. 
He died in London in 1780. There is a portrait of Joseph 
Green, by Copley, in the possession of Eev. W. T. Snow of 
Jamaica Plain. Green often run a tilt with Mather Byles, 
unhorsing his clerical opponent with his goose-quill lance. His 
residence was between the house of Dr. AVarren and the Crom- 
well's Head. 



68 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



CHAPTEE 11. 

FROM THE ORANGE-TREE TO THE OLD BRICK. 

Hanover Street. — General Warren. — Tlie Orange-Tree. — Concert Hall. — 
Brattle Street. — Samuel Gore. — John Smibert. — Nathaniel Sniil^ert. — 
Colonel Trumbull. — The Adelphi. — Scollay's Buildings anil Sciuare. 

— Queen Street Writing School. — Master James Carter. — Cornhill. — 
Brattle Street Parsonage. — Old Prison. — Captain Kidd. — Court 
Houses. — Franklin Avenue. — Kneeland. — Franklin. — Edes and Gill. 

— Green and Russell. — First Book and Newspaper printed in Boston. — 
Rufus Choate. — Governor Leverett. — John A. Andrew. — Henry Dim- 
ster. — Town Pump. — Old Brick. — General Knox. — Count Rimiford. 

— John Winslow. 

STANDING at tlie head of Hanover Street, we are sensible 
that improvement has ploughed a broad furrow through 
the North End. Away before us stretches a broad avenue, 
where once vehicles passed each other with difiiculty. As the 
old street was, there were places where it was no great feat 
to jump across. This was the old highway from Winnisim- 
met Ferry to Treamount Street, first called Orange-Tree Lane, 
from the tavern at its head. Hanover Street extended at first 
only from Court to Blackstone Streets. Why this name, a per- 
petual reminder of a detested House, should have been re- 
tained, when Queen retired before Court, and King succumbed 
to State, we cannot otherwise answer than by supposing the 
changes during the Eevolution spasmodic, rather than syste- 
matic efforts of republicanism. 

As wo look down this street, a little way on our left stands 
the American House. On the ground it covers lived that early 
martyr to American freedom. General Joseph Warren, who in 
17G4, after his marriage, took up his residence and the practice 
of medicine on this spot. He went to Brattle Street Church, 
near by. In 1774, while the " Boston Port Bill " was in oper- 
ation, there was a good deal of suffering in consequence of the 



FROM THE OrvANGE-TREE TO THE OLD BRICK. 69 

closing of the port, and at this time Colonel Putnam, better 
known as " Old Put," came to Boston with a drove of sheep 
for tlie inliabitants, and was Warren's guest. 

It was Warren who caused the alarm to be given of the 
British expedition to Concord, by sending Paul Pevere on liis 
fiimous night ride, and gave timely warning to Hancock and 
Adams. There are many stories of the manner of Warren's death 
at Bunker Hill, some of them higldy colored. He was killed 
after the retreat began, a little way in the rear of the famous 
redoubt. General Howe, who knew Warren well, said his 
death was equal to the loss of five hundred men. Colonel 
John Trumbull, who, when in England in 1786, painted liis 
picture of the Battle of Bunker Hill, gives the following rela- 
tion of the flill of Warren by Colonel Small, who w^as on the 
held, and is represented by Trumbull endeavoring to save the 
life of Warren : — 

"At the moment when the troops succeeded in carrying the 
redoubt, and the Americans were in full retreat, General Howe, 
who had been wounded by a spent l)all, was leaning on my arm. 
He called suddenly to me, ' Do you see that elegant young man 
who has just fallen ?' I looked to the spot to which he pointed. 
' Good God- ! ' he exclaimed, ' I believe it is my friend Warren ; 
leave me then instantly, — run, — keep off the troops, — save him 
if possible ! ' I flew to the spot. ' INIy dear friend,' I said to him, 
' I hope you are not badly hurt.' He looked up, seemed to recol- 
lect, smiled, and died. A musket-ball had passed through the 
upper part of his head." 

The body lay on the field until the next day, when it was 
recognized by Dr. Jeffries and John Winslow of Boston, and 
interred on the spot where he fell. General Howe's solicitude 
does not seem to have extended to AVarren's remains, which, 
however, received a soldier's burial. After the e^'acuation the 
body was disinterred and deposited in King's Chapel, and sub- 
sequently in St. Paul's, Tremont Street. The ball which killed 
Warren is now in possession of William H. jSIontague of Boston. 
It is a common ounce musket-ball, and does not look at aU 
flattened. It must ever appear unaccountable why General 
Ward, at Cambridge, did not attempt to recover the body of 



70 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

the President of the Provincial Congress. The usages of war 
must have been well known to him, and Howe was not the man 
to refuse the request. 

Thus died in " the imminent deadly breach " the young hero 
at the early age of thirty-four. President of the Committee of 
Safety, of the Provincial Congress, and Major-General, he 
declined the command at Bunker Hill, taking the jDlace of a 
common soldier. Deeply hurt by the reflections cast upon the 
courage of his countrymen, he is said to have exclaimed, " I 
hope I shall die up to my knees in blood."" To the remon- 
strances of his friend, Elbridge Gerry, who begged him not to 
go to Bunker Hill, Warren replied, " I) idee et decorum est jjro 
patria moriy 

Adjoining the American House on the west are Codman's 
Buildings, covering the ground where stood the famous Earl's 
Coffee House in bygone days. It was established in 1806, and 
was the headquarters of the New York, Albany, and other mail 
coaches. 

" Go call a coach, and let a coach be called." 

On the north corner of Hanover Street was the Orange-Tree 
Tavern, which designated the northerly end of Treamount Street 
in 1732, and beginning of Hanover Street in 1708. It contin- 
ued a tavern until 1785, when it was advertised to be sold. 
The name was from the sign of an orange-tree, and the inn was 
noted for the best well of water in the town, — never dry nor 
known to freeze. Here was the first hackney-coach stand we 
have an account of, set up by Jonathan Wardwell, keeper of 
the Orange-Tree, in 1712. He was succeeded by Mrs. Ward- 
well, who kept the house in 1724. 

Concert Hall, of which a considerable moiety is now in the 
street, was on the southerly corner, and was also a tavern, kept, 
in 1792, by James Vila. The site was first known as Houchin's 
Corner, from a tanner of that name who occupied it. The 
building was of brick, though it underwent various alterations 
until torn down in 18G9, to make way for the widening of 
Hanover Street. Concert Hall was owned by the family of 
Deblois until 1679. Before the Eevolution it was a resort of the 



FROM THE ORAXGE-TREE TO THE OLD BRICK. 71 

Friends of Liberty, and as early as 1755, after the installation 
of Jeremy Gridley as Grand Master of the ]\Iasons in Xorth 
America, it was used by the Grand Lodge for occasions of 
meeting or festivity, and continued to be so used until- the 
present century. Here have met Gridley, the Warrens, llevere, 
Tomlinson, Oxnard, Webb, and others. Here Captain Preston 
was dallying on the evening of the fatal 5tji of March, 1770, 
when he was summoned in hot haste to begin the first act of 
the great conflict of the American Revolution. The American 
prisoners captured at Bunker Hill are said to have been tried 
by a military court in Concert Hall. In 1768 the obnoxious 
Commissioners of Customs ventured to return from the Castle, 
while the town was under the control of the newly arrived 
British troops, and had an ofhce here, with a sentinel at the 
door. And here came Samuel Adams and James Otis to re- 
monstrate with them. 

According to the "Xews Letter," concerts were held in the old 
hall as early as January, 1755, when "a concert of musick " 
was advertised to take place there, tickets at four shillings each. 
Governor Hancock gave, in 1778, a grand ball in Concert Hall 
to the officers of D'Estaing's fleet, at which three hundred per- 
sons were present. The Society of the Cincinnati also held 
meetings in this hall, and the jMassachusetts Mechanic Char- 
itable Association had their first meetings therein. Peter B. 
Brigham was for about forty years mine host of Concert Hall. 

A little east of Concert Hall on Hanover Street lived AVilliam 
Cooper, Town Clerk of Boston for nearly half a century. His 
term embraced the Revolutionary period, during which he was 
an ardent friend of the Whig cause. He was a brother of the 
patriotic pastor of Old Brattle Street Church. 

Brattle Street was opened in 1819, from Court Street to the 
Church. Before this it was a narrow way, known first as Hil- 
lier's Lane, and sometimes as Belknap's, and as Gay Alley. 
Looking towards the ruins of tlie old church we notice, on the 
north side of the street, a continuous row of fourteen buildings, 
uniform in their general appearance. This was the first block 
of stone buildin(:cs erected in Boston. 



72 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

At the head of Brattle Street lived Samuel Gore, elder brother 
of Christopher, afterwards governor of the Commonwealth. 
Gore was a painter, and was one of those stout-hearted mechanics 
who furnished the muscle of the Revolution while Adams and 
Otis supplied the brain. One of the Tea Party of 1773, Gore 
was one of those who seized the two brass guns, Hancock and 
Adams, from the^un-house in Tremont Street, and conveyed 
them to the American lines under the very eyes of the British. 
These two guns are now in Bunker Hill Monument. 

The celebrated Scotch painter, John Smibert, owned and 
occupied the premises between Brattle Street and Cornhill in 
1743, having acquired part through his marriage with Mary 
Williams of Boston, and part by purchase. The biographers 
have but little to say about this pioneer of the fine arts in 
America. He was before West or Copley, and is said to have 
influenced the works of the latter, as well as those of Allston 
and Trumbull. 

Smibert must have had a large and lucrative custom, for he was 
possessed of property in Boston and Roxbury, which he bought 
from time to time, and at his decease left in his studio thirty- 
five portraits, valued by the appraisers at £ 60 55. 8d Thirteen 
"landskips" were estimated at the moderate sum of <£ 2 13s., 
while four historical pieces, " and pictures in that taste," were 
considered worth <£16. Two conversation pictures, whatever 
they may have been, were thought worth £ 23 6s. M. His 
negro girl, Phillis, went for £ 26 13s. 4d He kept his horses 
and chaise, in which he used to take his wife, Mary Smibert, to 
Lynde Street Church to hear good Dr. Hooper. 

Smibert came over to America in 1728 with the Dean, after- 
wards Bishop Berkeley, settling in Boston in 1730. The largest 
known work of Smibert's in this country is his picture of 
Berkeley and family, in which the portrait of the artist is intro- 
duced. This painting is now in the possession of Yale College. 
His portrait of Jonatlian Edwards is said to be the only one 
extant of that learned and eminent divine. 

Nathaniel Smibert, son of John, took up the profession of 
his fatlier. He went to the Latin School, under Master Lovell, 



FROM THE ORANGE-TREE TO THE OLD BRICK. 73 

in his early youth, but soon turned to liis father's brusli and 
easel, with the promise of making a hnished artist, but died at 
the early age of tAventy-one, deeply regretted by all who knew 
him. 

Colonel John Trumbull, aide-de-camp to Washington during 
the siege, retired in disgust from the service in 1777, on account 
of the date of an appointment to the rank of colonel, by Gates, 
being rejected by Congress. He then resumed his study of 
painting in Boston, amidst the works of Copley, and in the 
room which had been built by Smibert, and in which remained 
many of his works. Governor Hancock sat for his portrait to 
Trumbull while the latter was in Boston. Hancock was presi- 
dent of the Congress which ignored Trumbull's rank, and had 
also spoken rather slightly of his family being well cared for by 
the government, on seeing the latter at the head(|uarters of 
Washington. Trumbull was stung by the ungenerous remark, 
and when, after having served as a volunteer in the expedition 
to Ehode Island in 1778, he fell ill on his return, he at hrst re- 
pelled the advances of Governor Hancock, who, by considerate 
attentions, repaired his original offence. Trumbull was a histor- 
ical painter. The Trumbull Gallery at Yale contains fifty-seven 
pictures by him. An engraved likeness of Governor Yale, for 
whom the college was named, is one of the first you see on 
entering the gallery. The following is his epitaph in the 
churchyard at Wrexham : — 

" Born in America, in Europe bred, 
In Africa travelM, and in Asia wed, 
Where long he lived and tlirived ; at London dead. 
]Much Good, some 111 he did ; so hope all 's even, 
And that his soul through Mercy 's gone to heaven." 

Trumbull exhibited, in 1818, in Faneuil Hall, his picture of 
the Declaration of Independence, and the venerable John Adams 
was prevailed upon to visit it. He approved the picture ; and, 
pointing to the door next the chair of Hancock, said, " There, 
that is the door out of which Washington i*ushed when I first 
alluded to him as the man best qualified for CLmmander-iu- 
Chief of the American Army." * 

* Miss Quincy's Memoir. 
4 



74 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Colonel Trumbull's liistorical paintings in the rotunda of the 
Capitol at Washington have gained him a world-wide reputa- 
tion ; his " Sortie from Gibraltar " is now in the Boston Athe- 
naeum. He was a fellow-student with Stuart, under West. 

The paint-room of the Smiberts and of Trumbull continued 
to be improved by various artists of lesser note until 1785. At 
this time Mrs. Sheaffe occupied the abode of the Smiberts as a 
boarding-house. This lady has acquired celebrity through her 
children. In those days painters sometimes styled themselves 
limners. One of Mrs. Sheaffe's boarders varied the monotony 
of portrait painting by doing hair-work in the neatest manner. 
Part of the Smibert estate went to make the present Brattle 
Street. 

This locality, after having served the 'New England Museimi, 
was, in course of time, appropriated by the Adelphi Theatre. 
John Brougham was, in 1847, associated with Mr. Bland as 
manager, with Mrs. Brougham and Mr. Whiting in the corps 
dramatique. The Adelphi was a side-splitting affair, defying 
the conventionahties of the modern stage. An open bar stood 
in the rear of the auditorium, to which the audience were in- 
vited to repair upon the falling of the curtain. 

One of the greatest changes that has occurred in Boston is 
the transformation of the over-crowded thoroughfares around 
what was known as " ScoUay's Buildings " into the spacious, 
pleasant area we now call Scollay Square. All of the original 
is gone except the distinctive appellation, and what has existed 
in some form for two centuries has vanished 

" Like the baseless fabric of a vision." 

The Scollays were Scotch, from the Orkneys. John Scollay 
is mentioned, in 1G92, as lessee of Winnisimmet Ferry. An- 
other John Scollay, of the Eevolutionary period, was a man of 
considerable note in Boston. He was one of the first Fire- 
AYards of the town, and a selectman during the siege. His son, 
William, is the one for whom the buildings and square were 
named. The name, however, and his proprietorship only date 
back to about 1800. William Scollay was a commander of 
the Cadets, an apothecary at No. 6 Old Cornhill, and resided 



FROM THE ORANGE-TREE TO THE OLD BRICK. 75 

on tlie site of the ]\Iiiseiini in Treniont Street. He was promi- 
nently identitied witli Charles Bullinch and others in the im- 
provement of Franklin Street. 

A long row of wooden buildings at one time extended from 
the head of Cornhill to nearly opposite the head of Hanover 
Street. Both ends of this wedge-shaped range of houses, with 
the point towards Hanover Street, were cut off at various times, 
lea\dng only the brick structure of Scollay, lately removed. 
Scollay's Building was sui)posed to have been erected by Patrick 
Jeffrey, who came into possession in 1795. Neither age nor 
incident render the building an object of special interest. 

Opposite to where Cornhill now opens into Court Street was 
erected, in 1683 - 84, the second school-house in the town. The 
first being styled the Latin School, this was termed the Free 
"Writing School. It is clearly mentioned in 1 69 7, and continued 
to be used until 1793, when it became private property, the 
school — then known as the Centre Reading and Writing 
School — being removed to School Street. The first master 
here was Samuel Cole. 

The preamble to the first law establishing schools reads 
thus : — 

" It being one chief project of Satan to keep men from the knowl- 
edge of the Scrij)tures, as in former times keeping them in unknown 
tongues ; to the end, therefore, that learning may not be buried in 
the graves of our forefathers, in church and Commonwealth, it is 
enacted," etc. 

The school-house is brought into notice in 1744, by a some- 
what curious afiixir. It appears that Captain W. ^Montague, 
afterwards a British Admiral, came ashore from his ship, the 
frigate Eltham, then lying in Nantasket Roads, and, accom- 
panied by a party from his vessel, indulged in a regular sailor's 
lark on shore. In the course of their rambles the party com- 
mitted some depredations on the school-house, for which war- 
rants were issued against some of the offenders. 

James Carter was the most famous of the masters of this old 
school. He was a pedagogue of an extinct type, and nftor a 
long term of service, continuing almost to the time of his death, 



76 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 

was buried December 2, 1797. His house adjoined the school- 
house on the west. Turell's Museum once occupied the old 
school-house, part of which was removed upon the completion 
of Cornhill, to afford a free passage into Tremont Street. 

Green and Russell, one of the old printing houses of Boston, 
transacted business in an okl building that stood on the site of 
Scollay's, in 1755. Joseph RusseU, one of the partners, carried 
on the business of an auctioneer, in which he was very success- 
ful, and became the owner of the property. William Vassall, 
a royalist refugee, in 1776, was the next proprietor, followed 
by Jeffrey. The Colonial Custom-house stood very near this 
locality in 1757, but we have been unable to discover its exact 
site. 

Cornhill owes its name, no doubt, originally, to its London 
prototype. It is the second street which has borne the name 
in Boston, and was first called Market Street, as it opened a 
new route to Faneuil Hall Market. The stores erected in this 
street were the first raised on granite pillars in Boston. Uriah 
Cotting built the street in 1817. To his genius Boston owes a 
debt not yet suitably recognized. Mr. Cotting's remains lie 
beneath an humble tomb in Granary Burying-ground, but we 
may appropriately apply to him the epitaph of Sir Christopher 
Wren : — 

" Reader, if thou seekest his monument, look around." 

Opposite to us, now the premises of the Adams Express Com- 
pany, was the old Parsonage House of Brattle Square Church, 
given to it by Mrs. Lydia Hancock in 1765. She was the wife 
of Thomas Hancock (uncle of the patriot), and resided in the 
old house, as also did her fiither, Colonel Daniel Henchman, 
grandson of the old Indian fighter. Henchman was a book- 
seller and bookbinder, and Thomas Hancock served his time 
with him. Colonel Henchman established the first paper-mill 
in the colony, at Milton. Since their day it was the residence 
of the pastors of the church, — last, that of Dr. Lothrop. 
This house has been noted as one of the dwelling-places of 
James Otis. 

The Old Prison stood on the spot where now the massive 



FROM THE ORxVNGE-TREE TO THE OLD BRICK. 77 

granite Court House is placed. From it the street was very 
early named Prison Lane, changed to Queen Street in 1708, 
and to Court in 1784. What the Old Prison was like is left to 
conjecture, but we will let an old master of the imaginative art 
describe it : " The rust on the ponderous iron-work of its oaken 
door looked more antique than anything else in the Xew 
World. Like all that pertains to crime, it seemed never to 
have known a youtliful era." The fancy of Hawthorne in 
locating a blooming rose-bush on the grass-plot beside the 
prison door is striking. Here were confined the victims of the 
terrible witchcraft delusion. 

" Wlio is he ? one that for lack of land 
Shall fight upon the water." 

This hea\y oaken door stood between the notorious pirate, Wil- 
liam Kidd, and liberty. He arrived in Boston in Jime, 1G99, 
with his sloop, and was examined before the Earl of Bellomont 
and the Council of the province. On the 6th of June Kidd 
was seized and committed to prison with several of his crew, 
and his vessel taken possession of. When arrested, Kidd 
attempted to draw his sword and defend himself. By order of 
the king, he was sent to England in a frigate, and arrived in 
London April 11, 1700. He was examined before the Admi- 
ralty, and afterwards before the House of Lords, where great 
efforts were made to implicate the Earl of Bellomont and other 
of the lords in Kidd's transactions. The pirate, after a long 
confinement, was finally hung at Execution Dock. He died 
hard. The rope broke the first time he was tied up, and he 
fell to the ground ; a second trial proved more successful. 

It has been claimed that Kidd was not a pirate. He was an 
officer in the British navy prior to 1691^ married in this coun- 
try, and had commanded a merchant ship owned by liobert 
Livingstone, a wealthy !N'ew York merchant. When, in 1695, 
the coast of ^ew England was infested with pirates, Living- 
stone proposed to the Earl of Bellomont to employ Kidd to 
go in pursuit of them, and off'ered to share the expense of 
fitting out a vessel. Application was made to the home gov- 
ernment for a thirty-gun ship, and a commission for Kidd for 



78 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

this purpose ; but, the government being then unable to furnish 
a vessel, the Earl of Bellomont, Lords Halifax, Somers, Eom- 
ney, Oxford, and others contributed, with Livingstone, to lit 
Kidd out in the Adventure Galley. He received a commis- 
sion from the Court of Admiralty in December, 1695, author- 
izing him to cruise against the king's enemies. 

Once at sea, Kidd turned pirate, reversing the adage " Set a 
rogue to catch a rogue," and made several captures ; but his ex- 
ploits preceded him, and on his return to New England he was 
arrested. The search after the pirate's hidden treasure has 
continued ever since. A pot of dollars was dug up in 1790 
on Long Island, supposed to have been Kidd's. The fate of 
the freebooter has often been lamented in the melancholy 

ditty, — 

" My name was Captain Kidd, as I sailed," etc. 

The Old Prison, ugly and uncouth, gave place to a new in 
1767, designed by Governor Bernard. This was, two years later, 
destroyed by fire, the prisoners being with difficulty rescued ; 
some of them were badly burned. "* The site was then appro- 
priated by a Court House built of brick, about the Eevolution- 
ary period, three stories high, with a cupola and bell. Before 
the erection of the County Court House (City Hall), in 1810, 
this building was used by all the courts of law held in the 
county. 

At this time the County Jail was in an old stone building 
situated between the Old Court House, just described, and the 
New. On the ground where it stood was formerly an old 
wooden building called the Debtor's Jail. The County Jail 
and Municipal Court House were, in 1822, situated in Lev- 
erett Street. 

In 1851 the keys of the Old Prison in Court Street were 
found under the office of the Leverett Street jail, where they 
had lain since 1823. They were three in number; were from 
twelve to eighteen inches in length, and of a most primitive 
construction. The keys weighed from one to three pounds 
eacli, and when attached to the jailer's girdle, must have been 
* Drake's History of Boston. 



FROM THE ORAXGE-TREE TO THE OLD BRICK. 



weighty arguments to liis wards. These keys, when found, 
were over a hundred years old. What a tale they could tell ! 

In September, 1833, the corner-stone of the present Court 
House M'as laid, and it was completed in 1836. The building 
is massive and unattractive. AVithin its granite walls the fugi- 
tive slave cases were tried, and here also Professor John W. 
Webster received the death sentence for the murder of Dr. 
Parknian. 

The little alley which enters Court Street opposite the east- 
erly side of Court Square is not unknown to fame. It is to- 
day FrankUn Avenue, but has been 
Dassett's, or Dorsett's Alley, and in 
1722 was a part of Brattle Street. 
Daniel Webster's first office was on 
the northerly corner of this alley. 
On the corner where now stands the 
Advertiser building Samuel Knee- 
land began the printing business 
in. 171 8, in quite another fashion. 
Thomas, in his History of Printing, 
says: — 




OLD PRINTING-PRESS. 



" Wilhani Brooker, being appointed 
Postmaster of Boston, he, on Monday, 
December 21, 1719, began the publication of another newspaper in 
that place. This was the second published in the British Colonies, 
in North America, and was entitled ' The Boston Gazette.' James 
Franklin was originally employed as printer of this paper ; l>ut in 
two or three months after the publication commenced Philip Mus- 
grave was appointed Postmaster, and became proprietor of it. He 
took the printing of it from Franklin, and gave it to Kneeland. 
Kneeland also published lii're, in 1727, 'The New England Jour- 
nal.' He occupied the othce for about forty years." 

This is also the location assigned James Franklin, the brother 
of Benjamin, who, as wc have mentioned, printed "The Boston 
Gazette," on Monday, December 21, 1719. He began, August 
6, 1721, the publication of "The New England Courant," the 
third newspaper in the town. It was, like the other papers, 



80 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

printed on a half-sheet of foolscap, and, being of a more pro- 
gressive cast than the others, soon fell under the ban of rigid 
Puritans like Eev. Increase Mather. The first number of this 
paper, made famous by Benjamin Franklin's connection with it, 
has been rej^rinted, and the whole contents might easily be 
contained in a single column of one of our present journals. 
Two very primitive woodcuts, one representing a war ship 
under full sail, the other a postman galloping over a village, 
adorn the pages. 

Benjamin became his brother's apprentice at the age of twelve, 
in 1718. He soon began to write clandestinely for the paper, 
and thrust his productions furtively under the office door. But 
his essays were approved and printed. In 1723, James Frank- 
lin being forbidden to publish the Courant, it was issued under 
the name of his younger brother, and bore the imj)rint, " Boston, 
printed and sold by Benjamin Franklin, in Queen- Street, where 
advertisements are taken in." 

Benjamin Franklin remained but a short time with his 
brother after this. The old press on which he worked is in 
the possession of Major Poore, of West Newbury, Mass., who 
obtained it of Isaiah Thomas's heirs. It bears no date, and is 
old enough to be located at any time since printing began, 
without danger of dispute. Major Poore is confident of the 
authenticity of this press, tracing it by Thomas to the office of 
James Franklin. The building, interesting by its association 
with the early history of printing in Boston, became a book- 
store, ornamented with a head of Franklin, and disappeared 
more than fifty years ago. The amusing rencontre of Franklin 
with his future wife. Miss Reed, of Philadelpliia, wiU always 
excite a smile. 

The house was occupied for eighty years as a printing-house, 
by Kneeland and others. In 17G9 it became the office of Edes 
and Gill, who continued there until hostilities commenced, in 
1776. Edes and Gill printed a copy of the " Stamp Act," in 
a pamphlet of twenty-four pages. They also published " The 
Boston Gazette and Country Journal," a successor of the Ga- 
zette of Franklin, Kneeland, etc., which had been discontinued. 



FKOM THE ORAXGE-TREE TO THE OLD BRICK. 



81 




Edes and Gill, when they printed the Stamp Act, occupied 
premises on the south side of Court Street, about on the pres- 
ent site of the Adams Express Co. In their back office, on tho 
old corner, the council for the destruction of the tea was held, 
of Avhich Samuel vVdaras was the master spirit. The Gazette, 
imder the control of Edes and Gill, was 
the paper in which Adams, Otis, Warren, 
Quincy, and other leaders of popular feel- 
ing, wrote, and became conspicuous for its 
able political articles. We present two speci- 
mens of the renowned British Stamps. 

Over the printing-office was a long room 
in which were wont to meet the active pa- 
triots. They took the name of the Long 
Eoom Club. Samuel Adams was the leader. Hancock, Otis, 
Samuel Dexter, AVilliam Cooper, town clerk. Dr. Cooper, War- 
ren, Church, Josiali Quincy, Jr., Thomas Dawes, Samuel Phil- 
lips, lioyal Tyler, Paul Kevere, Thomas Fleet, John Winslow, 
Thomas Melvill, and some others, were members. In this 
room were matured most of the plans 
for resistance to British usurpation, 
from the Stamp Act to the formation 
of the Provincial Congress at Water- 
town. 

After the avenues from the town 
were closed by General Gage, Edes 
made his escape by night, in a boat, 
with a press and a few types, with 
which he opened an office in Water- 
town, and printed for the Provincial 
Congress of Massachusetts. John Gill, his partner, remained 
in Boston and was imprisoned for printing treason, sedition, 
and rebellion. Green and Russell, in 1758, became occupants 
of the corner, and printed the " Weekly Advertiser " therein, 
which may be considered the progenitor of the present journal 
of that name. 

Court Street was long the headquarters of the newspaper 
4* F 




^^<'^HrLLLXGS/ 



82 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

press. During exciting political controversies abuse sometimes 

waxed warm. In the language of a writer at the beginning of 

the present century, — 

" Press answers press ; retorting slander flies, 
. And Court Street rivals Billingsgate in lies." 

The first book printed in Boston was an election sermon 
preached to Governor John Leverett, the Council, and Deputies 
of the Colony, May 3, 1676. It was a small quarto pamphlet 
of sixty-three pages. John Foster was the printer. 

The first regular newspaper was the " News Letter," issued 
April 24, 1704, by John Campbell, Postmaster of Boston at 
that time. Bartholomew Green was the printer. Green con- 
tinued to print it until the close of 1707. The building in 
which the News Letter was printed stood very near the east 
corner of Avon Street, on Washington. 

Tudor's Buildings are named from Colonel William Tudor, 
who lived on the site. He M^as a member of the old Boston Bar, 
having studied with John Adams. He was colonel and judge- 
advocate-general in the Revolutionary army, on the staff of 
Washington. Colonel Tudor was also a member of the Massa- 
chusetts House and Senate, Secretary of State 1809-10, and 
one of the founders of the Historical Society. Fisher Ames, 
Judge Parker, afterwards Chief Justice, and Josiah Quincy, 
studied law with him. 

It is related that Colonel Tudor was once presented at the 
court of George III. by our ambassador, Eufus King. His 
Majesty catcliing the name, ejaculated in his disjointed way : 
*' Eh ! what, what, Tudor, Tudor, — one of us, eh 1 " 

Rufus Clioate, who as an advocate left no successor at the 
Boston bar, had an office in the gloomy granite block that for- 
merly stood below the Court House, on the site of the Sears 
Building. He had also, for a time, an ofhce on Tremont Row. 
Choate came to Boston in 1834, after having studied law in 
the office of William Wirt at Washington. He was not long 
in taking the place left vacant by ^Ir. Webster. 

Besides pathos, which he could bring to bear with over- 
whelming effect, Choate possessed a fine humor. It is said 



FROM THE ORANGE-TREE TO THE OLD BRICK. 83 

that, coming into court one day to hear a decision against liim 
from Chief Justice vSlunv, who was by no means a handsome 
man, Choate addressed his Honor in these words : " In coming 
into the presence of your Honor I experience the same feeHugs 
that the Hindoo does when he Lows before his idol, — I know 
that you are ugly, but I feel that you are great." "^ 

]\Ir. Choate's face possessed great mobility, and his voice was 
capable of the most varied modulation. When pleading a crim- 
inal cause he held court, jury, and auditory alike in a spell, 
and seldom tailed to sway the jury by his elocpience. He had 
the magnetism of a natural orator, and could make his auditors 
weep or laugh at will. Mr. Choate held the offices of State 
representative and senator ; was elected to Congress from the 
Essex district ; and succeeded Webster in the Senate in IS-il. 
In 1853 he was attorney-general of Massachusetts and a mem- 
ber of the Constitutional Convention. He retired from prac- 
tice in 1858, on account of fliiling health, and dmd in Halifax 
in 1859, while €)i route to Europe. He was sixty years old 
when this event occurred. 

AVliere now stands the stately Sears Building was once the 
habitation of Governor John Leverett, during whose adminis- 
tration occurred King Philip's war. Leverett went to England 
in 1644, and served under Cromwell, 

" From Edge-Hill Fight to Marston Moor." 

Charles II. made Leverett a knight, — a title Avhich he never 
assumed. Few names connected with the colony are more 
honorable than Governor Leverett's. He commanded the An- 
cient and Honorable Artillery ; was agent of the colony in 
England ; on terms of intimacy with the Protector, major-gen- 
eral, and dei)uty-governor. He died in 1679. Governor Lev- 
erett's house was afterwards in State Street, next east of the 
present Exchange. Before the adoption of the Federal Consti- 
tution the post-office was located on this corner. In the build- 
ing lately taken down was once the law oflic'e of John A. An- 
drew, a man whose memory is warmly cherished by the soldiers 
of Massachusetts in the Rebellion, who gave him the name of 
the war governor. 

* Bench and Bar. 



84 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



On the northeast corner of Court and Washington Streets 
was the estate of Henry Dunster, lirst president of Harvard 
College. Here also stood the Town Pump, yielding its cooling 
fluid to our thirsty ancestors, or drenching some maudlin va- 
grant of the kennel. Here is Hawthorne's invocation from the 
Town Pump to the passers-by : — 

" Like a dramseller on the Mall at muster-day, I cry aloud to all 
and sundry, in my plainest accents, and at the very tiptop of my 
voice : Here it is, gentlemen ! Here is the good liquor ! Walk 
up, walk up, gentlemen, walk up, walk up ! Here is the superior 
stutf ! Here is the unadulterated ale of Father Adam, — better 
than Cognac, Hollands, Jamaica, strong beer, or wine of any price ; 
here it is by the hogshead or single glass, and not a cent to pay ! 
Walk up, gentlemen, walk up, and help yourselves ! " 

Public notices and proclamations were affixed to the Town 
Pump. 

A little south of the Sears estate is Joy's Building, around 
which is a vacant space now known as Cornhill Court and 
Court Avenue, once Cornhill Square. 

This is the site of the second location of the First Church 

of Boston, removed from 
State Street in 1640. In 
1808 the society sold this 
site to Benjamin Joy, on 
which he erected the present 
structure, and the church 
was removed to Chauncy 
Street. From the church 
the space around it took 
the name of Church Square. 
The old meeting-house was 
of wood, but after standing 
seventy-one years, was de- 
stroyed by the great lire of 
1711, and was then rebuilt 
of brick. After the building of the Second Church in Hano- 
ver Street this house took the name af the " Old Brick." It 




OLD BRICK CHURCH. 



FKOM THE ORANGE-TREE TO TII^ OLD BRICK. 85 

was of three stories and decorated with a bell-tower and clock. 
This clock was, without doubt, the first placed in any i)ublic 
position in the town. The records show that in 1 7 1 G - 1 7 the 
town voted to obtain a town clock to be set up in some conven- 
ient place in Coridiill. Before this the bells were called clocks. 
Tlie bell of the Old Brick sounded the alarm on the evening of 
the Massacre of ISIarch 5, 1770. 

On the corner of State Street, nearly opposite the Old Ih-ick, 
was the bookstore of Daniel Henchman, and later that of Whar- 
ton and Bowes. In this shop Henry Knox, afterwards one of 
the most famous generals of the Revolutionary army, was an 
a])pren*tice. Here he ac(][uired, by reading, the rudiments of the 
military art. The store was the resort of the British officers, 
who were very friendly mth the future general. At eighteen 
Knox was lieutenant of the grenadier comj^any of the Boston 
liegiment, — a company distinguished for its martial appearance 
and the precision of its evolutions. He was one of the Avatch 
on board the tea ship before it was destroyed, and by his prox- 
imity was early at the scene of the Massacre in King Street. 
In Knox's account of tliis affair he said, " Captain Preston 
seemed much agitated. Knox took him by the coat and told 
him, ' for God's sake to take liis men back again, for if they 
fired, his life must answer for the consequences.' AVhile I was 
talking with Captain Preston the soldiers of his detachment 
had attacked the people with tlieir bayonets. There was not 
the least provocation given to Captain Preston or his party." 
Knox, after serving his time, published for himself. " A Dis- 
sertation on the Gout," etc., bears his imprint in 1772. 

After Lexington Knox escaped with his wife from Boston ; 
Mrs. Knox concealing within the lining of her cloak the sword 
he subsequently wore through the war. She acconq)anied her 
husband through all his canqiaigns. The Manpiis Chastellux, 
who visited the head(piarters of the Americjin army in 1782, 
says : " We found Mrs. Knox settled in a little farm where she 
had passed part of the campaign ; for she never quits lier hus- 
band. A child of six montlis and little girl of three years old 
formed a real family for the general. As for himself, he is be- 



86 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 

tween thirty and forty, very fat, but very active, and of a gay 
and amiable character. From the very first campaign he was 
intrusted with the command of the artillery, and it has turned 
out it could not have been placed in better hands. It was he 
whom M. du Coudray endeavored to supplant, and who had no 
difficulty in removing him. It was fortunate for M. du Cou- 
dray, perhaps, that he was drowned in the Schuylkill, rather 
than be swallowed up in the intrigues he was engaged in." 

Knox's corpulency was the subject of an ill-timed pun frcm 
Dr. Byles. An intimacy existed before the war, and when, on 
the day Boston was evacuated, Knox marched in at the head of 
his artillery, the doctor audibly remarked, " I never saw an 
ox fatter in my life." Knox did not relish the joke from the 
old tory, and told Dr. Byles he was a " fool." 

The graduate of the little shop in Cornhill was volunteer aid 
at Bunker Hill, commanded the artillery during the siege of 
Boston, and became Secretary of War. His greatest service, 
perhaps, was the bringing of more than fifty camion, mortars, 
and howitzers from Ticonderoga, Crown Point, etc., to the lines 
before Boston. This feat was accomplished early in 1776, the 
ordnance being dragged on sledges in midwinter almost through 
a wilderness. 

Knox was a generous, high-minded man. His portrait, by 
Gilbert Stuart, hangs in Faneuil Hall. A gunning accident 
having injured one of his hands, it is concealed in the picture. 

The celebrated Benjamin Thompson, a native of Woburn, 
afterwards a count of the German Empire, was, like Knox, an 
apprentice to a shopkeeper in Boston at the time of the Mas- 
sacre. He was at the American lines in Cambridge at the time 
of Bunker Hill, and accompanied Major, afterwards Governor 
Brooks until they met the retreating Americans. After endeav- 
oring unsuccessfully to obtain a commission in the Continental 
army, he turned loyalist. He was sent to England by General 
Howe after the fall of Boston, but returned to America and 
raised a regiment of horse, called the " King's Dragoons." 

After the war he was knighted, and became Sir Benjamin 
Thompson. The Elector of Bavaria, whose service he entered 



FROM THE ORANGE-TREE TO TIIi; OLD BRICK. 87 

in 1784, made him a count, with the title of Count Rumford, 
that being the ancient name of Concord, X. H., where Tliomp- 
son had formerly resided. Rumford went afterwards to Paris, 
and married the widow of the celebrated Lavoisier, from whom, 
however, he afterwards separated. 

The Rumford Professorship at Harvard testifies to the remem- 
brance of this distinguished man for his native country. Ho 
left a munificent bequest to the College for the advancement of 
the physical and mathematical sciences. 

John AVinslow, one of Knox's compatriots, and a captain in 
Crane's Artillery during the Revolutionary War, was a hardware 
merchant with his uncle, Jonathan Mason, at Xo. 12 Corn- 
hill, just south of the present Globe newspaper office. He 
remained in Boston during the siege, and buried the Old South 
communion plate in liis uncle's cellar ; his uncle was deacon of 
that church. It was Winslow who recognized the body of 
Warren, the day after the battle of Bunker Hill. He was at 
Ticonderoga, Saratoga, and White Plains, and held a number 
of State offices after the war. Winslow lived in Purchase 
Street, just north of the Sailors' Home. 



88 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



CHAPTEE III. 

FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON PIER. 

Captain Keayne. — Coggan, first Shopkeeper. — Old Cornhill. — Old State 
House. — First Church. — Stocks and Whipping-Post. — John Wilson. — 
Wilson's Lane. — United States Bank. — Royal Exchange Tavern. — 
William Sheaffe. — Royal Custom House. — Exchange Coffee House. — 
" Columbian Centinel." — Benjamin Russell. — Louis Philippe. — Louis 
Napoleon. — Congress Street. — Governors Dummer and Belcher. — First 
United States Custom House. — Post-Office. — Bunch of Grapes. — General 
Lincoln. — General Dearborn. — First Circxilating Library. — British Coffee 
House. — Merchants' Row. — First Inn. — Lord Ley. — Miantonimoh. — 
Kilby Street. — Oliver's Dock. — Liberty Square. — The Stamp Office. — 
Broad Street. — Commodore Downes. — Broad Street Riot. — India Street 
and Wharf. — Admiral Vernon. — Crown Coffee House. — Butler's Row. 

— The Custom House. — Retrospective View of State Street. — Long Wharf. 

— The Barricado. — T Wharf. — Embarkation for Bmiker Hill. 

THE earliest settler on the southwestern corner of State Street 
was Captain Robert Keayne, who has left his name to us 
in connection with a legacy to build a Town House. He was 
also the first commander of the Ancient and Honorable Artil- 
lery, and was by business a tailor. Captain Keayne fell under 
the censure of court and church for selling his wares at exorbi- 
tant profits, — we have before mentioned that the authorities 
regulated the prices of goods, products, etc. His will, of nearly 
two hundred pages, is devoted largely to an efl*ort to relieve 
himself of this charge. What would Washington Street say 
to-day to such a regulation 1 

The opposite or northwest corner of State Street was occu- 
pied by John Coggan, one of tlie names in the original Book 
of Possessions. He has the distinction of establishing the first 
shop for the sale of merchandise in Boston. From this small 
beginning dates the traffic of Boston. 

Having crossed ancient Cornhill, which name applied to that 



FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON PIER. 



89 




OLD STATE HOUS£ IX 1791. 



part of AVasliington Street 
from Dock Square to 
Scliool Street, and in 
which congregated the 
early booksellers, we are 
at the head of old King 
Street. Before us is the 
earliest market-place of 
the town, on the space 
now occupied by the Old 
State House. King Street 
was changed to State in 
1784, but it was frequent- 
ly called Congress Street 
before the present name was settled on. 

" And mark, not far from Faneuil's honored side, 
Where the Old State House rises in its pride. 
But, 0, liow cluuiged ! its halls, alas ! are tied. 
And shop and office fill their slighted stead." 

The early history of this edifice has been given in connec- 
tion with the City Hall, as its progenitor. Besides being used 
as a Town House and by the Colonial Courts, it has been occu- 
pied by the General Court of the Colony and of the State, by 
the Council of the Province, and as a barrack for troops. It 
was the first Exchange the merchants of Boston ever had, and 
is still used for a similar purpose. In it met the Convention 
to ratify the Constitution of the United States before adjourn- 
ing to Federal Street Church. In the west end was located 
the Post-Office, in its beginning, and again in 1838, when a 
force of fifteen clerks was sufficient for the transaction of its 
business. In 1832 it was again slightly damaged by fire. 

Under its shadow the Massacre was enacted by a detachment 
of the 29th British liegiment, the result of constant collisions 
between the people and the soldiery. At the time of its occu- 
pation by the British troops, — admitted by Governor Bernard 
in 17G8, — James Otis moved to have the Superior Court held 
in Faneuil Hall, " not only as the stench occasioned by the 



90 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

troops may prove infectious, but as it was derogatory to the 
honor of tlie court to administer justice at the mouths of can- 
non and the points of bayonets." This referred to the estab- 
lishment of the main-guard opposite, with t\v^o field-pieces 
pointed toward the Old State House. 

The following was the interior arrangement of the building 
after the fire of 1747. The eastern chamber was originally 
occupied by the Council, afterwards by the Senate. The Eep- 
resentatives held their sittings in the west chamber. The 
floor of these was supported by pillars, and terminated at each 
end by doors, and at the east end by a fiight of steps leading 
into State Street. On the north side were offices for the clerks 
of the supreme and inferior courts. In the daytime the doors 
were kept open, and the floor served as a Avalk for the inhabi- 
tants who thronged it during the sessions of the courts. After 
the removal of the Legislature to the new State House the 
internal arrangement was changed to suit later occupants. 

In the Chamber of Eepresentatives, according to John Adams, 
"Independence was born" and the struggle against the en- 
croachments of the mother country sustained for fourteen years 
by the Adamses, Bowdoins, Thachers, Hancocks, Quincys, and 
their illustrious colleagues. According to Hutchinson, in this 
chamber originated the most important measures which led to 
the emancipation of the Colonies, — with those giants who, 
staking life and fortune upon the issue, adopted for their 

motto, 

" Let such, such only, tread this sacred floor, 
Who dare to love their country, and be poor." 

It was customary to read the commissions of the royal gov- 
ernors in presence of the court, attended by military display, 
' in tlie Court House, as it was then called. The news of the 
death of George 11. , and accession of George III., was read 
from the balcony ; the latter was the last crowned head pro- 
claimed in the Colonies. 

The popular indignation against tlie Stamp Act found vent, 
in 176G, in T)urning stamped clearances in front of the Town 
House. A council of war was held by Gage, Howe, and Clin- 



FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTOX PIER. 91 

ton, here before Bunker Hill. On tlie 25tli July, 177G, the 
Declaration of Independence was read from the east balcony 
by William Greenleaf, Sheritf. All the Continental troops in 
the vicinity of Boston were paraded in State Street, and at its 
conclusion tired thirteen volleys commemorative of the thirteen 
Colonies. Here the Constitution of Massachusetts was planned. 
In 1778 Counl D'Estaing made a splendid entry into Boston 
with his fleet, and was received by Governor Hancock in the 
Council Chamber. 

After the Eevolution it became the place of meeting of the 
Legislature, and has been ever since called the Old State House, 
— except during the interval Avhen it was the City Hall, — 
and this name is its customary appellation. In October, 1789, 
AVashington received the homage of the people, from a tempo- 
rary balcony at the west end. A triumphal arch Avas thrown 
across the street there, and a long procession passed before him, 
whose salutations he occasionally returned. In January, 1798, 
the Legislature took possession of the new State House. 

The building has undergone material alterations, especially in 
the roof, which gives it a more modern appearance, and the stee- 
ple or tower was once considerably higher than at present. The 
sun-dial, which formerly adorned the eastern gable, has been 
superseded by a clock ; the Lion and Unicorn once replaced the 
ornamental scrolls at either end. There have been a lottery 
office, engine-house, and even a newspaper published in the old 
building, — the latter printed in 1805, in the Senate Chamber, 
and called the "Repertory." After the Grand Lodge of Masons 
was burnt out of the Exchange Coffee House it occupied quar- 
ters in the Old State House. At the great fire of 1711, by 
which it was destroyed, several gentlemen, at imminent risk of 
their lives, succeeded in saving the Queen's portrait from the 
flames. 

The old First Church of Boston was situated on the ground 
now covered by Brazer's Building, until its removal to another 
location. Here preached John Wilson and John Cotton, and 
here came Winthrop and Bellingham, with their zealous Puri- 
tan followers, men 



92 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



" Stern to inflict and stubborn to endure, 
Who smiled in death. 

In an old two-story wooden house which stood upon the site 
of Bmzer's Building were located the first United States Bank, 
and also the first government Post-0 Ihce. The former remained 
here until the erection of the building on the site of the Ex- 
change ; the Post-Office was removed here from Cornhill. 
Jonathan Armstrong was postmaster, and easily performed, from 
his perch on a high stool, all the duties pertaining to his office. 
The figure of a winged Mercury, well executed in wood by 
Simeon Skillin, a Xorth End carver, was placed over the door 
of the Post-Office in State Street. The tutelar deity was rep- 
resented in the act of springing from a globe. In one hand he 
held his emblematic rod, in the other a letter directed to the 
president of the Branch Bank. 

In front of the old meeting-house stood the whipping-post, 

and probably the stocks, though 
this latter engine has been lo- 
cated in front of the Old State 
House. In later years, the 
stocks and pillory were a mova- 
ble machine, on wheels, and had 
no fixed position. Both were 
used as a means of enforcing 
attendance, or punishing oftences 
against the church, and their 
served, no doubt, as a gentle ro- 




THE STOCKS. 



location at its very portal 
minder to the congregation. 

It is recorded that in the year 1753 a woman stood for an 
hour in the pillory near the Town House, amid the scoffs and 
jeers of the multitude. The Scarlet Letter is no myth ; Haw- 
thorne had but to turn to the criminal records of the Colony 
for the dramatic incidents he has related. The General Court 
enacted in 1G95 a law to prevent marriages of consanguinity, 
the declared penalty of breaking which was that the man or 
woman offending should be set upon the gallows for an hour, 
with a rope about the neck, and in the way from thence to the 



FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTOX PIER. 



03 



common jail be severely whipped. The offenders were forever to 
Avetir a capital letter " I," cut out of cloth of a color different 
from their clothes, on the arm or back, in open view. If the 
culprit removed the letter, he or she was to be further whipped. 
Xo doubt there were Hester Prynnes thus branded and scourged 
in State Street. 

Public whipping was inflicted as late as 1803, and per- 
sons are living who witnessed it. By order of the Supreme 
Judicial Court of Massachusetts, two 
men were placed in the pillory, in the 
year mentioned, in State Street. Pier- 
pont, the owner, and Storey, master of 
the brig Hannah, having procured a 
heavy insurance on their cargo, for a 
voyage to the West Indies, the vessel 
was sunk in Boston harbor, November 
22, 1801, and a large portion of the in- 
surance collected. Fraud being proved, 
both as to the lading and loss of the 
brig, tlie Court decreed that Pierpont 
and Storey be set in the pillory in 
State Street two several times, one 
hour each time, and imprisoned two 
years, and pay the costs of prosecution. 
The sentence was duly executed, the pillory being placed near 
" 'Change " Avenue. The Sheriff usually performed the whip- 
ping by deputy. The whipping-post became a perambulating 
afiiiir, and at one time was stationed in "West Street. Its ac- 
knowledged utility appears by the Sessions Justice's famous 
charge, which lays down the law in somewhat starthng phrase. 

" Gentlemen of the grand jury : You are required by your oath 
to see to it, that the several towns in the county be provided accord- 
ing to law with. 

Pounds and schoolmasters, 

Whiijping-posts and ministers." 

John Wilson, first pastor of the First Cliurch, owned land 
on Cornhill and State Street ; the lane bearing his name, and 




THE PILLORY. 



94 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

running through his tract, was deservedly called Crooked 
Lane. His dwelling was on the site of the Globe Bank, de- 
molished in 1873 to widen the narrow way, which still retains, 
however, the old minister's name. 

Wilson's Lane is chiefly remarkable for the number and ex- 
cellence of its eating-houses. This circumstance, with its old 
name, calls to mind Tom Hood's lines : — 

" I 've heard about a pleasant land, where omelets grow on trees, 
And roasted pigs run crying out, ' Come eat me, if you please.' 
My appetite is rather keen, but how shall I get there ? 
* Straight down the Crooked Lane, and all round the Square. ' " 

The Merchants' Bank succeeded to the location of the United 
States Branch Bank, which was in its day a building of consid- 
erable architectural pretension. The two columns which now 
support the front of the Merchants' Bank performed a like ser- 
vice for its predecessor, and when taken down were fluted to 
correspond more nearly with the plan of the new building. 
Observation will show that the granite is of a difl'erent color 
from that used in the rest of the fagade. The United States 
Bank building was built of Chelmsford granite, in imitation 
of a Grecian temple. It was at first proposed to take the site 
of the Old State House, but the project — happily for the 
existence of this old monument — was abandoned. The struc- 
ture was erected in 1824 ; Solomon Willard was the architect; 
Gridley Bryant, master-mason. The columns referred to were 
brought from Chelmsford on ponderous trucks built for the pur- 
pose. On account of their great weight the proprietors of the 
bridges refused to permit the passage of the teams, and they 
were accordingly brought over the Neck. The moving of such 
unwieldy masses of granite — a marvel when it was first 
attempted — was eclipsed by the transporting of the columns 
for the Court House and Custom House. 

The pediment was a favorite resort for pigeons, which becom- 
ing somewhat troublesome, by order of Gardiner Greene, the 
president, a wooden cat was placed on the accustomed perch of 
the feathered visitors. They were at first a little shy, but soon 
ceased to have any fear of the sham grimalkin. It was then 



FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON PIER. 



95 




removed to tlie directors' room, and presided for a long time 
over the deliberations of the board. 

The United States Bank was established in 1791, and the 
charter expired in 1812, but was revived in 181 G, and finally 
dissolved in 1836. The bank originated in the want of money 
to carry on the government. The directors were appointed 
by the parent bank at - 

Philadelphia, and the div- ^0; %^, 

idends which the bank de- 
clared were made up from 
the business of all the 
branches. Under the cliar- 
ter of 1816 the capital 
was thirty-five millions, 
of which the government 
owned seven. The at- 
tempt to permanently es- 
tablish a bank under gov- 
ernment control, like the 
Bank of England, proved 
a failure, as is well known. The removal of the deposits by Gen- 
eral Jackson affected the Boston branch but little, but it brought 
to light a defaulting official. The receiving teller, whose name 
was John Fuller, finding discovery inevitable, put forty thousand 
dollars into his pocket one afternoon and absconded. In 1836 
Congress revived the charter, but Jackson vetoed it. A bank 
under the old title, established by the State of Pennsylvania, 
went into operation in the latter year, and continued until 1841. 

The old United States Bank was erected on the site of the 
Exchange, in 1798, and bore on its front an American eagle, 
with its wings outstretched, as if in the act of swooping upon 
the bulls and bears of the street. On the expiration of the 
charter the State Bank purchased the building, and the eagle 
was afterwards removed to Faneuil Hall, where it is one of the 
curiosities to be seen there. It is made of clay baked in an 
oven at the South End ; and the fractured edges cliii)ped away 
by relic-hunters have the appearance of broken pottery or tile. 



UNITED STATES BANK. 



96 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Formerly the proud bird of Jove, and emblem of our republic, 
was in the centre of the hall, guarded by an iron railing. The 
iron gates of the old bank now guard the entrance to the Cem- 
etery on Washington Street, near the St. James Hotel ; a 
rather singular transition from the shrine of Manmion to the 
abode of death. Thomas Eussell was the first President in 
1792, and Peter Roe Dalton, Cashier. The next location of 
the United States Bank was in Congress Street, on the west 
side, and not far from State Street. 

" — Wliere 's the jolly host 
You told me of ? 'T has been my custom ever 
To parley with mme host." 

The Royal Exchange Tavern was on the southwest corner of 
Exchange and State Streets, and gave the name of Royal Ex- 
change Lane to that tlioroughfare. Shrimpton's Lane was an 
earlier name. This tavern certainly dates back to 1727, and 
was then kept by Luke Yardy. At the time of the Massacre 
one Stone was the landlord. It was a resort for the officers of 
the British army before the Revolution. At the beginning of 
the present century it was kept by Israel Hatch, and was a reg- 
ular stopping-place for the Providence stages. 

The rencontre between Henry Phillips and Benjamin Wood- 
bridge, which ended in a duel on the Common, had its begin- 
ning in this house. After the fire of December, 1747, which 
destroyed the Town House, the General Court was held at 
Yardy's for the few remaining days of the session. The Royal 
Exchange was also a favorite hostelry of the Masons, Yardy 
being of the fraternity. At a Masonic procession on St. John's 
day Joseph Green notices the jolly landlord thus : — 

" Wliere 's honest Luke ? that cook from London ; 
For without Luke, the Lodge is undone. 
'T was he who oft dispell'd their sadness, 
And fdled the Brethren's hearts with gladness. 
Luke in return is made a brother, 
As good and true as any other, 
And still, though broke with age and wine, 
Preserves the token and the sign," 

The Royal Custom House, at the time of the Massacre, was 



FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON PIER. 97 

on the southeast corner of Exchange and State Streets. Joseph 
Harrison was Collector, and AVilliam Sheaffe Deputy. With the 
sentinel on duty at this point began tlie affray in State Street. 
The sentinel, abused, beaten, and likely to be overpowered, 
loaded his piece and shouted for assistance to the post of the 
main-guard, wliich was opposite the south door of the Town 
House. The deplorable results which followed are familiar. 
The old Custom House had a balcony, from which shots were 
fired at the populace during the Massacre. 

This circumstance, elicited during the investigation into the 
affair by the town authorities, did not tend to improve the re- 
lations between the people and the obnoxious officers of the 
customs. The town desired these officials to be present during 
the investigation and use the privilege of questioning the wit- 
nesses. Sheaffe, however, was the only one who attended. He 
had been a long time connected with the Custom House ; as 
deputy under Sir Henry Frankland, and as his successor when 
Sir Henry was removed for inattention to his duties. Sheaffe 
issued the famous AVrits of Assistance. He was the father 
of the celebrated Sir Eoger Hale Sheaffe, and a devoted loyal- 
ist. Sheaffe lived in the vicinity of Scollay Square in Court 
Street. He had some pretty daughters, of whom Sabine, in liis 
" Loyalists," says : — 

" Susanna, Mr. Sheaffe's oldest daughter, married Captain Ponson- 
by Mulesworth, a nephew of Lord Ponsonby. 

" The family account is, that on the day of the landing of a regi- 
ment of British troops in Boston, a halt was made in Queen (Court) 
Street opposite Mr. Sheaffe's house ; that Susanna, attracted by the 
music and the redcoats, went upon the balcony ; that I\Iolesworth 
soon saw her, was struck by her great beauty, gazed intently upon 
her, and at last said to a brother officer, who, like himself, was lean- 
ing against a fence, ' That gu-1 seals my fate.' " 

Margaret, another daughter of Mr. Sheaffe, was remarkable 
for her beauty ; so handsome, according to tradition, " no one 
could take her picture." Previous to her marriage, Lafayette, 
who admired her, said to her lover, " Were I not a married 
man, I 'd try to cut you out." 

5 G 



98 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



At the time of the Massacre the Custom House was in 
a building used as a dwelling by Bartholomew Green and 
family. King Street was then full of dwellings, the occupants 
using the lower floor for their business. This Green, a printer 
by profession, had, according to Thomas, the peculiar faculty of 
recognizing at sight any vessel belonging to the port of Boston. 
Perpetually on the watch, as soon as a vessel could be discovered 
with a S23y-glass he knew its name, and gave information to the 
owner. He had some small office in the Custom House at one 
time. 

He who stood on the balcony of the Old State House in 
1770 might count five taverns of repute in King Street. The 
Bunch of Grapes was the best punch-house, but Yardy's, the 
nearest, was probably most frequented by the barristers and 
officers of the court. 



■^*=^^^^u,^ 




EXCHANGE COFFEE HOI 



From our stand-point, at the lower end of the Old State 
House, Devonshire Street opens at our right hand. The Pud- 
ding Lane of yore is suggestive of good living. Accordingly 
we find the well-remembered Exchange Coff'ee-House was situ- 
ated in Congress Square, once known by the singular title of 
Half-Square Court. The name of this house owes its origin to 
the fact that the principal floor was intended to be used by the 



FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON TIER. 99 

merchants as an Exchange. It was a mammoth affixir of seven 
stories, far in advance of the wants of its day, and was com- 
pleted in 1808, having occupied two years and a half in build- 
ing ; it cost half a million. An unsuccessful speculation, it was 
the means of ruining many of the mechanics who were em- 
ployed in building it. Destroyed by fire November 3, 1818, it 
was rebuilt in a less expensive manner, and occupied as a tavern 
until 1853, when it was demolished, giving place to the build- 
ings known as the " City Exchange." 

The front of the Coffee House, on Congress Street, was orna- 
mented Avith six marble Ionic pilasters, and crowned with a 
Corinthian pediment. It had entrances on the State Street 
side and from Devonshire Street. The building was of an ir- 
regular shape, rather like a triangle with the apex cut off, and 
contained about two hundred and ten apartments. It was in 
the very centre of business, and was a stopping-place for stages 
going or returning from town. A number of Masonic Lodges 
occupied "the upper stories. 

Captain Hull made the Exchange his quarters when he was 
in port during the war of 1812. At the rooms of the Exchange 
was kei)t a register of marine news, arrivals, departures, etc. 
When Hull arrived in Boston after his fortunate escape from 
the British fleet in July, 1812, he wrote with his own hand in 
tills book the following : — 

" Whatever merit may be due for the escape of the Constitution 
from the British fleet, belongs to my first officer, Charles ]\lori'is, Esq. 

" Isaac Hull." 

On his arrival, after the memorable action with the Guerriere, 
Hull was the recipient of flattering attentions from the merchants, 
and indeed the whole population vied to do him honor. HuU, 
with straightforward manliness, wrote on the journal of the 
Coffee House a well-deserved triljute to the services of this same 
Lieutenant, afterwards Commodore Morris, who was severely 
wounded in the fight. 

D acres, who became Hull's prisoner after this engagement, 
lodged at the Exchange. Of him it is related, that when he 
went up the side of the Constitution, after leaving his own 



100 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

ship, Hull, eager to soothe the feelings of his gallant adversary, 
stepped forward, offered his hand, and said, " Dacres, my dear 
fellow, I am glad to see you ! " The reply of the discomfited 
Briton was, " D — n it, I suppose you are." The twain became 
afterwards firm friends. 

President Monroe visited Boston in July, 1817. He took 
apartments at the Exchange Coffee House. On the 4th a 
sumptuous dinner was served, at which the following guests 
were present. It would be hard to find a more distinguished 
company. General Swift, Superintendent of West Point Acad- 
emy, presided, assisted by Commodore Perry and Mr. Mason. 
The other guests were ex-President John Adams, Governor 
Brooks, Lieutenant-Governor Phillips, General H. Dearborn, 
President Kirkland, Chief Justice Parker, Judges Story, Jack- 
son, Davis, and Adams, Generals Cobb and Humphreys of the 
old army, Hon. Messrs. Pickering and Pales, Commodores 
Bainbridge and HuU, and other naval officers. The President 
returned the visit of the venerable John Adams, and the two 
walked, arm in arm, over the farm at Quincy, like any two 
plain country gentlemen. 

The fire which consumed the Coffee House was destructive. 
The keeper, Mr. Barnum, lost $ 25,000. Eleven printing-offices, 
the Grand Lodge of the State, and several other Masonic Lodges 
were burned out. 

Where the Traveller building stands was once the printing- 
office of the "Columbian Centinel," established in 1784. It 
Avas then the size of a sheet of commercial post writing-paper, 
and published semi- weekly. Benjamin Eussell was the editor, 
a name well known in the annals of Boston journalism. Eus- 
sell was an apprentice to Isaiah Thomas of the celebrated 
Worcester Spy. Thomas had the ill luck to be drafted in 1 780, 
and young Eussell volunteered in his place. During his ser- 
vice he witnessed the execution of Andre, at Tappan, as 
one of the guards. Eussell published the Centinel until 1824. 

When the Due de Chartres, afterwards Louis PhiUppe, was 
in Boston, an exile from his native country, he was in the habit 
of visiting the Centinel office to obtain the news from abroad, 



FltOM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON PIER. 101 

anil, it is said, occasionally wrote articles for the paper. The 
Centinel was, at this time, distinguished for the accuracy of its 
information in regard to the "war then waging between re[)ub- 
lican France and combined Europe. An atlas wliicli had be- 
longed to Louis enabled the editor to describe the topography 
of tlie battle-fields minutely, and thus surpass his contempo- 
raries. Louis Xapoleon, late Emperor of the French, Avas, if 
report speaks true, at a later day, an habitue of the Centinel 
office. Thus the representatives of two opposing dynasties have 
eagerly scanned the columns of the same republican newspaper 
for intelligence that was to make or mar their fortunes. Tlie 
Centinel was the leading Federalist organ of New England, and 
was ably conducted. 

Next is Congress Street, named for the National Legislature. 
The founders of Boston called it Leverett's Lane, from Elder 
Thomas Leverett, who owned the tract through which it passes. 
It was subsequently Quaker Lane, from the old Quaker jVIeet- 
ing-house situated therein. Congress Street, at its junction 
with State, was once only eleven feet wide ; and Exchange, even 
now scarcely deserving the name of street, was once as narrow 
as Wilson's Lane, but was widened through its entire length. 
The lower part of State, where it meets Long Wharf, was also 
widened, — a proceeding so repugnant to one of the proprietors, 
that he took his gun and threatened to shoot any one that 
attempted to remove his building. It was effected, however, 
without bloodshed. 

The Exchange is built upon ground which, in the olden time, 
belonged to Elder Thomas Leverett, who emigrated from Boston, 
England, where he had been an alderman, and a parisliioner of 
Eev. John Cotton. He was a man of property and distinction 
in the province. His more distinguished son, afterwards gov- 
ernor, became the owner of this i)roperty, which he parted with 
in 1G5G. It became afterwards two estates, each having a pro- 
prietor of consequence. 

Andrew Belcher, one of the most wealthy merchants of Bos- 
ton, and a contemporary with old Andre Faneuil, lived, in 1691, 
in the westerly part of tliis estate, which is described as " front- 



102 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

ing on tlie Broad Street near the Exchange." This was before 
they had found a name for the street. Belcher's house was of 
brick. He also owned two brick warehouses, " the one bigger 
and the other less," lying near the Town Dock ; an estate at the 
south corner of Washington and Bedford Streets, one in Wing's 
Lane, and other valuable property. He had been one of the Pro- 
idncial Council, and was a representative in 1698 and 1701. 

Jonathan Belcher, afterwards governor of "the Massachu- 
setts," was in his tenth year when Andrew, his father, came from 
Charlestown to live in Boston. While in Europe, the Bostonian 
was presented at court, and made so favorable an impression on 
George I. that the King appointed him governor in 1730. The 
year previous he had gone again to England as agent for the 
colony, — a position he had not obtained very creditably, accord- 
ing to Hutchinson. Governor Belcher became very unpopular, 
and was superseded, in 1741, by Governor Shirley; but was 
afterwards appointed governor of New Jersey. Shaw says 
Governor Belcher's house was after the model of Julien's, which 
is represented in another place ; he adds that it was standing a 
few years before he wrote, in 1817. Mr. Belcher was a very 
opulent merchant. His residence was in Orange Street, now 
Washington, in 1732. He was one of the foremost in organiz- 
ing tlie Hollis Street Church, and gave the Society land to build 
it upon. During his administration occurred the great religious 
revival, caused by the visit of Whitefield, and Faneuil Hall 
Market was built. Governor Belcher's son, Jx)nathan, of Bos- 
ton, became lieutenant-governor of Nova Scotia. He was an 
able jurist, and had been also Chief Justice of that province. 

Governor Leverett sold a part of his estate, next east of 
Governor Belcher's, to Jeremiah Dummer, goldsmith, in 1677. 
This Jeremiah, father of two distinguished sons, was himself a 
conspicuous man in the affairs of the town, and a deacon of the 
First Church. 

Wilham Dummer, the elder son, lieutenant-governor of the 
colony from 1716 to 1729, was a captain in the Ancient and 
Honorable Artillery in 1719. He was acting chief-magistrate 
during a great part of his term, the governor, Samuel Shute, 



FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON TIER. 103 

being absent from his post. The principal events of Governor 
Dummer's term were the establishment of a linen manufactory 
in the town, and the introduction of inoculation for the small- 
pox, during one of its periodical visits, by Dr. Boylston. This 
terrible distemper, whicli had scourged Boston Avitli great vio- 
lence at different times, was arrested by this simple expedient, 
whicli the AVestern world owes to the efforts of a woman. 
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu accompanied her husband to the 
Porte, where he was ambassador, in 1716. AVhile there she 
witnessed the custom among the Turks of engrafting for the 
small-pox. She at once devoted her extraordinary epistolary 
powers to procure the introduction of this great boon into Eng- 
land, and, by great exertions, happily succeeded. Franklin's 
paper was established while Dummer was acting-governor. 
Governor Dummer pro\dded in liis will for the manumission 
and care of his three negroes. He attended Hollis Street 
Church, living close at hand at the time. 

Jeremiah Dummer, the younger, was born in the old home- 
stead in State Street. He graduated at Harvard in 1699, and 
studied at the University of Utrecht, where he took a degree. 
A polished scholar and writer, he is known in pubhc life as 
the Massachusetts Agent in England, 1710-21. He published 
an elotpient defence of the New England charters when they 
were threatened in the latter year. 

In a building adjoining the west side of the Exchange 
was the first United States Custom House ; General Benjamin 
Lincoln was the first collector, and retained the position until 
1808. He occupied part of the house for a dwelling. A 
distinguished lievolutionary soldier. General Lincoln fought 
from the lakes to Savannah. He was with Gates at Saratoga 
as second in command, and with D'Estaing in the assault 
on Savannah. The fortune of Avar made him a prisoner to 
Sir H. Clinton in May, 1780, with the garrison of Charles- 
ton. Again, at Yorktown, he had the satisfaction of seeing 
the army of Cornwallis lay down their arms. In Shays' Eebel- 
lion of '87 Lincoln commanded the State forces ; he was also 
heutenant-governor in this year. General Lincoln's portrait, 



104 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

by F. A. Durivage, — copied from Sargent's picture in the 
Historical Society's Collection — is in the collector's room at 
the Custom House. 

The Merchants' Exchange, now the Sub-Treasury and Post- 
Office, is one of the most imposing edifices in State Street. It 
was erected in 1842, and covers ground on which stood the 
United States Branch, and afterwards the State Bank. 

The first action in regard to a post-office appears to have been 
an order of the General Court, November 5, 1639, as follows : — 

" For the preventing the miscarriage of letters, it is ordered, that 
notice bee given, that Richard Fairbanks, his house in Boston, is the 
place appointed for all letters, which are brought from beyond seas, 
or to be sent thither ; are to be brought unto him, and he is to take 
care that they bee delivered or sent according to their directions ; 
provided that no man shall be compelled to bring his letters thither 
except hee please." 

Somewhat later it seems to have become the custom to bring 
letters to the Exchange, in the Town Hall, to run the hazard of 
being forwarded by visitors ; but this proved so precarious a 
method that the Council, in 1677-78, appointed John Hayward 
Postmaster for the whole colony. John Campbell, publisher 
of the News-Letter, was Postmaster about 1704. 

In 1711 the Post-Office was in Old Cornhill, and, when the 
great fire occurred in October of that year was removed to the 
south side of Milk Street, opposite Eev. Mr. Pemberton's. It 
was removed back to Cornhill soon after this. AVilliam Brooker 
was Postmaster in 1719. In 1754 the Post-Office was in Corn- 
hiU, at the house of James Franklin, Postmaster ; in 1770 it was 
still in Cornhill, between King Street and Dock Square ; Tut- 
hill Hubbard was Postmaster in 1771. Between this date and 
1788 it occupied the corner of Court and Washington Streets 
(Sears Building), and in the latter year was removed to 44 
Cornhill, where New Cornhill now enters Washington Street. 

Post-routes were first established in 1711, to Maine and 
Plymouth once a week, and to Ncav York once a fortnight. 
In 1829 the Post-Office was located on the corner of Con- 
gress and Water Streets, and employed eight clerks ; and 



FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON TIER. 105 

in 1838 ill the Old State House, as related. It Avill soon seek 
another situation in Water Street, where a splendid editice is 
being erected, President Grant having assisted at the laying of 
the corner-stone. 

The Bunch of Grapes Tavern was on the corner of Kilby 
Street (formerly Mackerel Lane) and State. The iN'ew Eng- 
land Bank replaces the inn. This tavern existed as early as 
1712, and was then kept by Francis Hobnes; in 1731-33 it 
was kept by William Coffin ; Joshua Barker kept it in 1 749 ; 
and Colonel Joseph Ingersoll from 1764 to 1772. Captain 
John IMarston was landlord in 1777-78, AViUiam Foster in 
1782, and James Vila, who removed the same year to Concert 
HaU, in 1789. 

The sign of this hostelry was three clusters of grapes. AATien 
the building was torn down to give place to the bank, the 
bunches of gTapes were removed to the Commercial Coffee 
House, in ]\Iilk Street, which was, in its turn, removed, and two 
of the bunches now grace the front of a liquor store in Xorth 
Market Street.'^ 

Few of the ancient inns have had more notable guests than 
this. As long ago as 1728 Governor Burnet found a hospitable 
reception on liis arrival in Boston. In 1776, after the reading 
of the Declaration of Independence, the Lion and Unicorn from 
the Town House, Court House, Custom House, and all other 
British emblems that could be found, were collected in front of 
this hostelry and made a bonfire of. Allien Lafliyette arrived 
in Boston in October, 1784, he alighted at the Bunch of Grapes. 
The Society of the Cincinnati held their meetings here in 1787, 
and heard orations in the " Old Brick." 

Becrossing the street, we find that the Custom House was, 
in 1810, situated on the lower corner of Change Avenue, former- 
ly Pierce's, and afterwards Flagg Alley. General Henry Dear- 
born, of Kevolutionary fiime, succeeded the venerable General 
Lincoln as Collector in 1809, the latter having resigned on ac- 
count of the Embargo. It is said that General Lincoln wrote 
to President Madison, "that he had fouglit for the liberties of 

* E. Paige & Co.'s, 43 and 44 North Market Street. 
5* 



106 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

his country, and spent his best years in her service ; and that 
he was not, in his old age, to be made an instrument to violate 
what he had assisted to acquire." * 

General Dearborn continued to be Collector until appointed 
by Madison Senior Major-General, and ordered to the Canada 
frontier in 1812. His long and glorious career of public service 
extended from Bunker Hill, in 1775, to the capture of York, in 
1813. At the latter j^lace, now Toronto, was captured the royal 
standard of England, the only one that ever fell into our hands. 
This trophy is in the naval museum at Annapolis. By the in- 
trigues of his enemies the veteran was displaced from liis com- 
mand, but was refused the court of inquiry he solicited. He Avas 
minister to Portugal in 1822. General Dearborn lived in what 
was afterwards the Sun Tavern, on Batterymarch Street, more 
recently occupied by a Glass Company. He married James 
Bowdoin's widow, and was a man of very imposing presence. 

H. A. S. Dearborn, son of the old warrior, succeeded to the 
coUectorship. The younger General Dearborn held a number of 
offices, and is known as an author of several historical works. 
At the time of the Dorr Eebellion in Ehode Island he was Ad- 
jutant-General of IMassachusetts, and was removed for loaning 
the State arms to supjDress that affair. 

When the Custom House was located on the north side of 
State Street, the front was ornamented with two figures carved 
in wood ; one representing Hope leaning on the traditional 
anchor, the other Justice holding the scales aloft. These me- 
morials are now preserved in the insurance office occupying the 
same site. 

In 1810 the building in Custom House Street was completed, 
and occupied in December of that year, but was soon found too 
contracted for the government business. The United States 
Custom House had, for short periods, locations in Merchants' 
Row, on' the northeast corner of Corn Court, and in Half-Court 
Square, now Congress Square. The tablet in the building in 
Custom House Street is from the old Custom House. 

On this site was established, in 17G4, the first circulating 

* Miss Quincy's Memoir, 



FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON PIER. 107 

library in Boston, by Jolm ]\Iein, the most extensive bookseller 
of the day. His place was called the London Bookstore, and 
his stock contained, according to his advertisement, ten thousand 
volumes. 

Thomas says Mein came from Glasgow, in 17G4, with Eobert 
Sandeman. His shop was first on the north corner of what is 
now Franklin and Washington Streets, where, in addition to 
books, he sold Irish linens, etc. The firm at this time was Mein 
and Sandeman. 

John j\Iein is also associated with early printing in Boston, 
having been connected with John Fleming, in 1767, in the 
publication of the Boston Chronicle, the first semi-weekly in 
Kew England. 

The paper fell under the ban of popular censure, and was 
suspended in 1770, it having espoused the cause of the mother 
country. Mein was exhibited in effigy on Pope Day, 1769, 
and in the unique and horrible pageant was carried a lantern 
with this acrostic : — 

*' Mean is the man, M — n is his name, 
Enough he 's spread his hellish fame ; 
Infernal Furies hurl his soul, 
Nine million times from Pole to Pole." 

* Mein was afterwards the subject of a personal attack, and 
took refuge with the soldiery, making a final escape from the 
profane poetry and hard blows of the wrathful " Bostoneers " 
soon after, to England. 

As we are now among the Insurance Offices, it becomes ap- 
propriate to state that the first in the town was established by 
Joseph Marion, in 1724. His office was called "The Sun Fire 
Office in Boston," and was located near the site of the Globe 
Bank, 22 State Street. 

Where the beautiful marble building numbered 66 now 
stands was the British Coffee House, an inn kept by ^Ir. Bal- 
lard in 1762. It was of some prominence, and di\dded with 
its neighbors the patronage of the military and civilians. The 
repeal of the Stamp Act was celebrated here, and at the Bunch 
of Grapes in March, 1767. It was also the scene of the un- 



108 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

fortunate collision between James Otis and John Eobinson, one 
of the Customs Commissioners referred to in connection with 
Otis's residence. Otis went to the Coffee House alone, by ap- 
pointment, and was immediately attacked by Eobinson and Ms 
friends. A young man who went to the assistance of Otis 
was roughly handled and j)ut out of the house. 

The house seems to have been preferred by British officers ; 
for we find one of them, Surgeon Bolton, delivering a harangue 
from the balcony, ridiculing the orations of Warren and Han- 
cock, and abusive of the Whig patriots, while the main-guard, 
paraded in front, furnished an audience. Under the new regime 
this tavern was styled the American Coffee House. It became 
a place of public vendue, in 1786, by a firm who sold books in 
the chamber and jackasses in the street. The Massachusetts 
Bank long occupied its site. 

Merchants' Eow seems to have retained its original designa- 
tion, being thus described in 1708. Andrew Faneuil's ware- 
house Avas on the lower corner in 1732. This was then the 
lower end of King Street. The Eow followed an irregidar, 
serpentine course to the wharf on the southerly side of the 
Town Dock. 

On the west side of Merchants' Eow, about midway from 
State Street to Faneuil Hall, was the first house of entertain- 
ment in Boston. It was kept by Samuel Cole in 1634. Gov- 
ernor Vane, in 1636, invited Miantonimoh, the ^N'arragansett 
chief, to Boston, and the sachem repaired thither with a con- 
siderable retinue. The attendants of the chieftain were dined 
at Mr. Cole's, doubtless Avith many a grunt of satisfaction, for 
their landlord bore a good name, as we shall learn, from high 
authority. In what manner Cole fed liis score of painted iS^ar- 
ragansetts does not transpire. It must have vexed the spirit 
of the jolly Boniface full sore to know how to place liis guests 
at table. They did not know the use of chairs, so he may have 
seated them, according to their custom, in a circle on the floor, 
with his iron pot of meat in the centre, into which each might 
plunge his hand until satisfied. However, Indians were no 
uncommon sight in the town in those days. 



FROM THE OLD STxVTE HOUSE TO BOSTON PIER. 109 

Lord Ley, Earl of Marlborough, who was killed in a naval 
engagement with the Dutch in 1GG5, visited Boston in 1G37. 
He lodged at Cole's inn, and when urged by Governor Wintlirop 
to jiartake of his hospitality declined, saying that the house 
where he was was so well governed, he could be as private 
there as elsewhere. Lord Ley accompanied Sir Harry Yane 
back to England. His lordship's reply w^as not, it is said, rel- 
ished by the governor, who considered himself slighted and his 
hospitality and position neglected. 

Kilby Street, Avhich once boasted the euphonious name of 
Mackerel Lane, extended first only from State Street to what 
is Liberty Square, the jDortion beyond being known as Adams 
Street until 1825. ^Mackerel Lane was very narrow until the 
great fire of 1760, and crossed the creek in Liberty Square by 
a bridge at the foot of Water Street. On the map of 1722 
wharves line the east side of Kilby Street, and until about 
1800 Oliver's Dock came up to this street. Broad and India 
Streets had no existence until 1808-09. 

Oliver's Dock was originally marsh, and through Liberty 
Square a creek ran up as far west as Spring Lane. This was 
Governor Winthrop's marsh, and the head of this cove was in 
the vicinity of the spring mentioned in the Introduction. Shaw 
states that 

" The greater part of Congress Street is made land. An aged gentle- 
man, who lived near the spot, says that when the foundation of Joy's 
Buildings (corner of Congress and Water) was preparing, the re- 
mains of the hull of an old vessel, or large boat, with fragments of 
canvass and tarred rope, were dug up ; which shows the place 
had been once used as a graving-yard, or some similar purpose. 
From a view of the ground, there is reason to believe that the greater 
part of Congress Street, the whole of Kilby Street and Liberty 
Square, are built on flats, once covered by salt Avater." 

In noticing the great storm and tide in 1723 the WTitcr 
says, — 

" We could sail in boats from the southern battery (Howe's "UTiarf ) 
to the rise of ground in King Street." 

In very high tides the water has flowed up to the corner of 



110 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

State Street and Merchants' Eow. Sound logs have been dug 
up at the bottom of this street, which, from the a^jpearance of 
knots and branches, were supposed to have been feUed near at 
hand. 

Ohver's Dock, so named from Peter Ohver, is noted as the 
scene of an episode of the Stamp Act riots of 1765. A build- 
ing newly erected on the northeast corner of Kilby Street and 
Liberty Square was supposed by the people to be intended 
for a stamp office, and was torn down and tlirown into the 
dock. Liberty Square derives its name from this circumstance. 
It was so named at the Civic Feast in honor of the French 
Eevolution January 24, 1793, when a liberty-pole sixty feet 
in length, surmounted by the horns of the ox that had been 
roasted on Copp's Hill for the feast, was raised, and a salute of 
fifteen guns fired. The procession, after passing through the 
principal streets, pausing at Liberty Stump (where Liberty 
Tree had stood), and at the residences of " Citizens " Hancock 
and Adams, as they were then styled, then governor and lieu- 
tenant-governor, halted in State Street, where tables were laid 
from the Old State House to near Kilby Street. The roasted 
ox was there dispatched by the crowd amid a scene of con- 
fusion. In the afternoon an entertainment was provided at 
Faneuil Hall at which Samuel Adams presided. " Liberty 
and Equality " were toasted and sung, but as the bloody char- 
acter of the French Revolution became manifest in the execu- 
tion of Louis XVI., which had occurred tliree days before, the 
Civic Feast was not repeated. 

The first directory published in Boston was printed by Jolin 
i^orman, at Oliver's Dock, in 1789. It contained 1,473 
names. The directory of 1872 contains 102,117 names. 

Broad Street next invites attention. It was built, in 1808, 
by that great public benefactor, Uriah Cotting, whose improve- 
ment of Cornhill is already noticed. Until this street was laid 
out Batterymarch marked the water-line to its junction with 
Kilby Street. Broad Street was at first occupied for business, 
but the subsequent building of India Street rendered it una- 
vailable for this purpose, and it became the headquarters of a 



FEOM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON PIER. Ill 

respectable class of residents ; these were ousted in their turn 
by the Irish, who swarmed to this country in great numbers 
after the war of 1812. Among the early residents of Broad 
Street we find Lieutenant, afterwards Commodore John Downes, 
who served with distinction in the navy. He was in the attack 
on Tripoli under Preble, and with Davitl Porter in the Pacihc, 
where, in command of the Essex Junior, — to use the lan- 
guage of a contemporary, — "he played the devil among the 
whalers." 

Broad Street was, in June, 1837, the scene of a riot between 
the firemen and Irish. The affair grew out of an attempt of 
the firemen, while proceeding to a fire, to pass through the 
ranks of an Irish funeral cortege. This was resented, and led 
to a regular Donnybrook scrimmage, resulting in many broken 
heads, but no loss of life. Military force was used to put 
down the riot, which assumed serious proportions, but no 
poAvder was burned. The affray led to the disbandment of 
the whole fii'e department. 

India Street, flanked by India and Central Wharves, was 
built, the year after Broad Street, by j\Ir. Cotting. About mid- 
way of Central Wharf was formerly an arched passage-way, 
which presented the singular feature of a building supported by 
it, but having no land belonging to it, — to use a military 
j^thrase, it was in the air. There were formerly a number of 
these arches, — not the least among the curious objects to be 
seen in Boston, — and several are yet existing. 

Two other taverns remain to be noticed, of wliich the first is 
the Admiral Yernon. The name was from Edward Vernon, the 
admiral, who was known while he lived under the sobriquet of 
Old Grog. In bad weather he was in the habit of walking the 
deck in a rough grogram cloak, and thence had obtained the 
nickname. Whilst in command of the West India Station, 
and at the height of his popularity on account of his reduction 
of Porto Bello with six men-of-war, he introduced the use of 
rum and water by the ship's company.* The Admiral Vernon 
was on the lower corner of State Street and Merchants* Row, 
* Notes and Queries. 



112 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

and was kept by Eicliard Smith about 1743, and in 1775 by 
Mary Bean. 

The first house on Long Wharf was the Crown Coffee House, 
noticed in 1718. It was kept by Widow Anna Swords in 1 749, 
being then owned by Governor Belcher, while Governor William 
Dummer owned the next estate easterly. Eichard Smith, of 
the Admiral Vernon, kept it in 1749, and Eobert Shelcock in 
1751. It was, like the Admiral Yernon, a water-side resort, 
but is not known to possess any associations of marked interest. 
It stood where the building now is, having a westerly front on 
State Street, but the street has been widened here. Like the 
other inns, it was used as a dwelling by the proprietors. 

Peter Faneuil's warehouse was, in 1742 - 43 (the year of his 
death), below the Admiral Vernon, from which he carried on 
his largo business with the West Indies and Europe. Peter 
was not averse to a little sharp practice upon the King's revenue, 
for we find an extract of one of his letters which requests ad- 
vice, — " also what good French brand i/ is ivorth, and if it he 
possible to cloak it so as to ship it for riim" "^ Otherwise, Peter 
seems to have placed a high estimate upon his commercial honor, 
and his charities were numerous and open-handed. 

If you enter the little passage-way just below jMerchants' 
Eow, you will find a range of brick buildings, bounded north 
by Chatham Street and south by the passage-way. This is But- 
ler's Eow, and you may yet see the name cut in stone on the 
southeast corner of the block. Peter Butler, an old proprietor, 
had a warehouse and wharf here. Andrew, Peter, and Benjamin 
Faneuil all had warehouses on, or bounding upon, Butler's Eow. 
These were all merchants of high standing, which marks the 
locality as one of importance to the mercantile class. 

Seventy years ago the space between Batterymarch and State 
Streets was occupied by a ship-yard and wharves. Where the 
old Custom House stands, on Custom House Street, large ves- 
sels have been built and launched. 

The massive proportions of the new Custom House, which 
contains about the same number of cubic feet of stone as Bunker 
* Dealings wdth the Dead. 



FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON PIER. 113 

Hill ]\Ionument, stand on a foundation recovered from the sea. 
Begun in 1837, it took three years to make a secure foundation. 
The building is cruciform, of the Grecian Doric order, and has 
the pecuHarity that the roof is covered with granite tiles, ren- 
dering it completely fire-proof. Its position is not conspicuous, 
but it is one of the noticeable public edifices in Boston. It was 
completed in 1849, at a cost of over a million. A. B. Young, 
M. A., was the architect. 

We may now take a retrospective \4ew of State Street. It 
is the busy mart and exchange of the city, sacred to the worship 
of Mammon. Bills, stocks, and bonds are its literature, and 
in its vaults are fifty millions of doUars. Here Shy lock meets 
Antonio, and daily takes his pound of flesh. It is our Eialto, 
our Bourse, our Royal Exchange. But time was when Perez 
Morton dwelt where the Union Bank's strong cofi^ers are, and 
John Coburn took gentlemen boarders just below the Post- 
Office, — this, too, within the present century. 

Since Boston was, State Street has been a favorite theatre of 
military displays, — the train-bands of the hard-visaged Puri- 
tans, the solid tramp of the newly arrived British soldiery in 
1768, and of the reinforcements in 1774. Tlirough State Street 
marched the 5th and 38th to embark for Bunker Hill, and the 
tread of Rochambeau's gallant Frenchmen has Avakened the 
echoes of the old street. Since those more stirring scenes it 
has been the custom and delight of the citizen soldiery to 
" march up State Street." The bayonets of many a gallant 
regiment have glittered in the sunlight here, ere they marched to 
the front in the late civil war. Here, too. Burns, a poor fugitive 
was conducted by the whole police and military force of the 
city to the ship which took him back to slavery. But we 
have changed all that. 

The fire of 1711 left its mark in State Street, destroying all 
the upper part, the Town House, and the Old Meeting House. 
An attempt was made to save the bell of the latter, and several 
sailors ascended the cupola for that purpose ; but the flames cut 
off their retreat, and they perished in the falling ruins. In 
1747 the Town House was again destroyed. In the great fire of 

H 



114 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

1760 the street was again scourged by the devouring element, 
scarcely a building being left in the part below Kilby Street. 

State Street was also the scene of a fatal affray in August, 
1806, between Charles Austin and Thomas Oliver Selfridge, in 
which the former was killed. This affair made a great noise, 
and the day was long remembered as " Bloody Monday." James 
Sullivan was then Attorney-General, while the defence of Self- 
ridge was conducted by Samuel Dexter and Christopher Gore. 
The origin of the difficulty was political feud ; but, according 
to ]\Ir. Sargent, the immediate cause was a dispute between 
other parties, about seven roast pigs and ten bushels of green 
peas. Austin was killed between the Old State House and the 
Traveller Office. 

Long AVharf and State Street are so firmly united that they 
may be considered one to all intents and purposes. Before the 
wharf was built the lower part of State Street terminated at 
the Governor's Dock. The subject of building a wharf at the 
bottom of King Street was mooted, as early as 1707, by Oliver 
Noyes and others. In 1709- 10 the town voted to accept the 
proposals of Noyes and his associates to build a wharf, with a 
sufficient common sewer, from Andrew raneuil's corner to low- 
water mark, to be of the width of King Street. As originally 
projected, the wharf was to have a public way on one of its 
sides, thirty feet wide, for the use of the inhabitants and others 
forever. At about the middle a gap, sixteen feet wide, was to 
be left for the passage of boats ; the end was to be left free for 
the town to plant guns on, if occasion required. The name of 
the wharf was, first, Boston Pier. M. TAbbe Eobin describes 
the pier as "a superb wharf, advancing nearly two thousand feet 
into the sea, wide enough along its whole length for stores and 
shops." On the map of 1722 there appears almost a continuous 
row of buildings on the north side; on Price's plan of 1743 
the end of the wharf is fortified. 

The "T" of Long Wharf, formerly known as Minott's T 
(from Stephen Minott), is a part of the ancient structure known 
as the Barricado, or Old Wharf, which was a line of defence 
connecting Scarlett's Wharf, at the foot of Copp's Hill, with the 



FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON PIER. 115 

South Battery at the foot of Fort Hill. It enclosed the Town 
Cove, in which the shipping lay. The Barricado extended in 
straight lines from the wharf to the terminal points, making an 
angle at the junction with Long Wharf, ^vith the point towards 
the town. It was built of wood, and had openings on each 
side of Long Wharf for vessels to pass through. Apprehensions 
of invasion from the Dutch or French caused its construction. 
Atlantic Avenue now follows, substantially, the line of the 
Barricado. It crossed Long Wharf on the neck of the T, and 
two little islands to the north and south of the wharf furnished 
points of appui. Central Wharf was laid out over one of these 
islands, and large trees and stones, which had been used in 
building the Barricado, were found when excavations were 
making for the wharf. The other island was removed. The 
Old Wharf, being for defence only, was only wide enough to 
M^ork guns upon. It fell into gradual decay, and the last ves- 
tiges disappeared long ago. " T " Wharf, which name has 
sometimes erroneously been connected with the Tea Party, has 
always been noted for an excellent old well of water, from 
which ships were supplied. Minott and Andrew Faneuil 
owned it in 1718. 

When, in November, 1745, after that extraordinary and 
successful expedition, which resulted in the reduction of Louis- 
burg, Governor Shirley returned home in the Massachusetts 
Frigate, a splendid reception awaited him. He first landed at 
the " Castle," where he passed the night, coming up to Boston 
in the morning in the Castle barge. About noon he landed, 
with his retinue, at Long Wharf, under salutes from all the 
shipping in the port and the acclamations of the people. Here 
they were received by the dignitaries of the province and iovm., 
and by Colonel Wendell's regiment of militia, a Chelsea com- 
pany, the Troop of Guards, and another Troop of Horse, with 
the Cadets under Colonel Benjamin Pollard. The ringing of 
bells, illuminations, and fireworks prolonged tlie joyful occasion. 

General Thomas Gage landed at Long Wharf in May, 1774, 
and was received by the Troop of Guards, a regiment of militia, 
and the Cadets, under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel 



116 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Coffin, The reception was in the midst of a drenching rain, 
but was, nevertheless, attended by a great concourse of people. 
Six years before this umbrellas — or " umbrilloes," as they were 
called — were first used in Boston, and were, doubtless, put in 
requisition on this occasion. IS^early all the British troops that 
set foot in Boston landed at this wharf It was also the scene 
of the embarkation of the 5 th and 38th for Breed's Hill, who 
left so many of their number on its green slope. 

The stores on the wharf, deserted by most of their owners, 
were used during the siege for the storage of military and naval 
stores, of which a considerable quantity was recovered by 
Quartermaster-General Mifflin, — besides General Gage's char- 
iot, which was taken out of the dock broken, — when our forces 
entered the town. After the evacuation, the British fleet re- 
mained for some time anchored at Is^antasket, and was a source 
of continual alarm to the people. General Benjamin Lincoln 
organized a force which embarked from Long AVharf and took 
positions at Long and Pettick's Islands, Hull, Point Alderton, 
and elsewhere. The battery on Long Island sent a shot through 
the upper works of Commodore Banks's ship, when he signalled 
the fleet to get under way, blew up the lighthouse, and vexed 
the waters of Boston harbor no more. 

AYhen the news of the Embargo of 1812 reached the town it 
caused the greatest consternation. All the vessels that could 
get away before the port closed did so. Sunday, April 5, was 
as busy a day as any of the remaining six. Long Wharf, and 
every other, was crowded with trucks, sailors, and longshore- 
men. About fifty sail went to sea before the flag of Embargo 
was raised on Fort Hill. 

The embarkation of the troops which were to force the 
American works at Breed's Hill, from this wharf and from the 
Korth Battery (Battery AVharf ), was a scene to be remembered. 
The ships of war furnished the boats, which were in charge of 
CoUingwood, — afterwards so famous as Nelson's lieutenant, — 
then a midshipman. Erothingham graphically describes the 
display : — 

" When a blue flag was displayed as a signal, the fleet, with field- 



FROM THE OLD STATE HOUSE TO BOSTON PIER. 117 

pieces in the leading barges, moved towards Charlestown, The sun 
was shining in meridian splendor ; and the scarlet uniforms, the 
glistening armor, the brazen artillery, the regular movement of the 
boats, the flashes of fire, and the belchings of snioke formed a spec- 
tacle brilliant and imposmg." 

" Hark, from the town a trumpet ! The barges at the wharf 
Are crowded witli the Hving freight, and now they 're i)u.shing off. 
With clash and gUtter, trump and drum, in all its bright array. 
Behold the splendid sacrifice move slowly o'er the bay ! " 



118 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



CHAPTER lY. 

BRATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 

Old Comhill. — Paul Revere, — Amos and Abbott Lawrence. — Boylston's Al- 
ley. — Barracks of the 29th. — Blue Anchor. — Brattle Street Church, — 
General Gage. — Howe, Clinton, and Biirgoyne. — John Adams. — Head- 
quarters of Stage-Coaches. — Dock Square, — The Conduit. — To^vn Dock 
Described, — Quincy Market, — Origin of Markets in Boston. — The Tri- 
angular Warehouse, — Roebuck Passage. — Clinton Street. — The Old 
Market Museum. — Old Cocked Hat. — Faneuil Hall. — D'Estaing. — 
Lafayette. — Jackson. — Prince de Joinville. — Jerome Bonaparte. — Lord 
Ashburton. — The Portraits. — Corn Court. — Hancock House, — Talley- 
rand, — State Custom House, — The Conscription Riot. 

OUR way lies through that part of Old Cornhill from State 
Street to Dock Square. The Town Pump, which has been 
referred to, stood in the middle of Cornhill, on a line with the 
north side of Court Street, giving room for vehicles to jDass on 
either side. A drinking-fountain at the sidewalk would not 
inappropriately mark the place. 

At No. 50 Cornhill, coinciding with Crocker and Brewster's 
bookstore, we find Paul Revere, a man whose name occurs fre- 
quently in connection with the history of Boston. Descended 
from the sturdy old Huguenots, whose ancient family name was 
Rivoire, Paul Revere began business as a goldsmith, but, ere- 
long, took up the art of engraving on copper, in which he was 
self-taught ; a fact evident enough in his early attempts. 

Of his engravings of Dr. Mayhew, and the Rescinders, he 
might have said with Beau Brummel, " These are my failures." 
" The Massacre," " Cromwell's Head," etc., show a somewhat 
truer hand. But 

" Copperplate, with almanacks 
Engraved upon 't, and other knacks," 

did not fill the measure of Revere's ingenuity. He put in oper- 
ation the first powder-mill in the province, visiting Philadelphia 
■ — where was the only mill in the Colonies — for this purpose. 



BRATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 119 




120 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

The proprietor would only permit the Boston mechanic to go 
through his mill ; but this was enough, and the Provincial Con- 
gress soon had powder. Eevere was of the Tea Party; was 
lieutenant-colonel of a regiment of militia raised after the evacu- 
ation ; and was in the ill-starred Penobscot expedition of 1779. 
After the peace of 1783 he established a cannon and bell foundry 
at the ^N'orth End, and, later, works at Canton for the manufac- 
ture of malleable copper bolts, spikes, etc. A company at the 
latter place still bears his name. Paul Revere was also the first 
President of the Mechanic Charitable Association. 

When the engraver was at work upon the caricature of the 
seventeen members of the Legislature who voted, in 1768, to 
rescind the resolution to issue a circular to the Colonies calling 
a convention to oppose taxation without representation, entitled 
" A warm place. Hell," Dr. Church, who afterwards betrayed 
the patriot cause, dropped in, and, seeing what Revere was do- 
ing, seized a pen and wrote ; — 

" brave Rescinders ! to yon yawning cell, 
Seventeen such miscreants will startle hell. 
There puny villains damned for petty sin, 
On such distinguished scoimdrels, gaze and grin ; 
The outdone devil will resign his sway, — 
He never curst his millions in a day." 

When Amos Lawrence first came to Boston, in 1807, from 
his native town of Groton, he began business in Cornhill, on 
the corner which makes the turn into Dock Square. We are 
assured that the rental of $ 700 per annum seemed, at that 
time, to presage ruin to the future millionnaire. Mr. Lawrence, 
whom we find set down as a shopkeeper, removed afterwards to 
the situation on the opposite side of CornhiU, now occupied by 
a weU-known carpet firm. At this time he boarded with Mrs. 
Dexter, in Portland Street, as did also his brother Abbott, an 
api)rcntice in his store. The munificent public and private 
charities of Amos Lawrence will long perpetuate his memory. 
To Williams College he gave upwards of $40,000, and to 
Bunker HiU Monument large sums and personal effort. 

Abbott Lawrence, the apprentice, became an eminent Boston 
merchant, besides holding many offices of public trust. He 



BRATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 121 

was the founder of the city of Lawrence ; was in the City 
Council in 1831, a member of Congi'ess two terms, and minister 
to England from 1849 to 1852. He also founded the Lawrence 
Scientific School at Cambridge, endowing it muniticently. 

We have mentioned among the peculiar features of the town 
the arches, which in various places tunnel the buildings, and 
furnish a short cut from street to street. A covered passage is 
now before us, the oldest, it is believed, in Boston. Altera- 
tions have taken place in the buildings, but a similar way was 
here long prior to the Revolution. At the time of the Boston 
ISIassacre, and for two years previous. Brattle Square was a sort 
oijjlace d'armes for British troops, and in the alley began a col- 
hsion between some grenadiers of the 29th and a few citizens 
on the evening of the memorable 5th of March. 

As early as 1734 John Draper, who published the Boston 
IS'ews-Letter in 1732, and was printer to the Governor and 
Council, lived on the east corner, and from him it took the 
name of Draper's Alley. In 1776 Benjamin Edes, the printer, 
took the house next to Draper, part of which formed the alley, 
so that its present occupation by a large printing firm is entirely 
legitimate. The passage was known both as Draper's and 
Boylston's Alley. 

Opposite the opening into Brattle Street was Murray's Bar- 
racks, in which the 29th were quartered. This regiment was 
thoroughly hated by the Bostonians before the Massacre, and 
after tliis tragedy, in which it was the chief actor, there is Httle 
question that it would have been exterminated in detail but for 
its removal to the Castle. It is a singular fact that a major of 
the 29th, Pierce Butler, became a citizen of the United States 
and a Senator from South Carolina, becoming, in 1812, an ad- 
vocate for war against his native country. The officers of the 
29th lodged at Madame Apthorp's. Her house stood in the 
angle now covered by the Central House. 

AVhere the City Tavern now is was once the locality of the 

Blue Anchor Tavern, but this was not the original " Blew 

Anchor," which was in Cornhill, very near the site of the 

Globe newspaper building. The old tavern was kept in 1691 

6 



122 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 

by George Monck, and as early as 1664 by Eobert Turner. 
Savage says : "At the sign of the Blue Anchor, Turner fur- 
nished lodgings and refreshments to members of the govern- 
ment, to juries, and to the clergy, when summoned into synod 
by our General Court." The rooms in the Blue Anchor were 
designated as the " Cross Keyes," " Green Dragon," the "Anchor 
and Castle Chamber," and the " Kose and Sun Low Eoom." '^ 
What should we think in these days of such a bill as the fol- 
lowing abstract of an election dinner to the General Court in 
1769 presents?— 204 dinners, 72 bottles of Madeira, 28 of Lis- 
bon, 10 of claret, 17 of j)ort, 18 of porter, 50 "double bowls" 
of punch, besides cider. A double bowl of punch held two 
quarts, enough to satisfy thirsty Jack Falstaff himself. 

At about the same time Joseph IngersoU, of the " Bunch of 
Grapes," furnished the Council with two dozen Madeira, three 
dozen Lisbon, four and a half gallons A^idania (" to mix with 
the water "), and six double bowls of punch. Only fifty cents 
in our currency was charged for anything eatable. Verily, 
Hutchinson and his associates were no ascetics. 

At our left hand rises the wreck of Old Brattle Street Church. 
" The tower that long had stood tlie crash of thunder and the warring winds " 
is now, as we write, all that is left of the historic edifice which 
dated back to 1772, just one hundred years before its demolition. 

The first building was erected in 1699, of wood, and was for 
a time known as the " Manifesto Church," in consequence of a 
declaration of principles by it, in answer to a j^rotest from the 
older churches against its more liberal form of worship. The 
old church was never painted, and the tower and bell were on 
the west side, while the entrance was at the south side. Its 
ruinous condition caused it to be rebuilt of brick, as it lately 
stood. John S. Copley, the painter, made a plan for the new 
building, but it was rejected on account of the expense, and 
that of Major Thomas Dawes accepted. Governor Hancock 
gave a thousand pounds, and a bell, on which was inscribed, — 

" I to the Churcli the living call, 
And to the grave I summon all, " 

* Whitmore's Notes to John Dunton's Letters. 



BRATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 



123 



This was the church of Cohiian, the Coopers, Thacher, Buck- 
minster, Edward Everett, Palfrey, and Lothrop, an array of 
clerical talent unsurpassed in the Boston pulpit. General Gage 
quartered the 29th in the church and vicinity, taking up his 




BRATTLE STREET CHURCH. 



own quarters in the house opposite. Gage told Mr. Turell that 
he had no fears for his men while quartered within such walls. 
Nevertheless, the night before the evacuation a twenty-four 
pound shot from Cambridge struck the tower, and flilling to 
the ground was picked up by Mr. Turell, and in 1824 was 
imbedded in the masonry, where it remained until the work 
of demolition began. 

When the society sold the church, they reserved the ancient 
quoins, pulpit, bell, and cannon-ball. The bell given by Gov- 
ernor Hancock became cracked, and was sold ; the present one 
having been purchased in London in 1809. The society voted 



124 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 




WINDOW OF BRATTLE STREET 
CHURCH, WITH BALL. 



to make Mr. Wakefield the custodian of the cannon-ball, to be 
placed by him in the front of his new building on the old site, 
and occupy the same position as in 
the church. The rustic quoins, of 
Connecticut stone, have been placed 
inside the tower of the new church 
on Commonwealth Avenue. One of 
these, which had the name of John 
Hancock inscribed upon it, was mu- 
tilated by the King's soldiers, who 
owed a special spite to King Han- 
cock, as they styled him. Dr. John 
Greenleaf 's name was on another of 
the quoins. 

During the occupation by troops, 
services appear to have been held 
occasionally in the church, as the Boston Gazette, of Septem- 
ber 21, 1775, states that "the Rev. Dr. Morrison received 
a call to preach in the elegant new church in Brattle Street, 
vacated by the flight of Dr. Cooper, and on Sunday he deliv- 
ered an excellent discourse to a genteel audience." The tenor 
of this discourse was upon the fatal consequences of sedition, 
and was adapted to the " genteel " audience. Of the pastors, 
besides Cooper, noted as a zealous coworker with the patriots, 
there was Buckminster, who had taught Daniel Webster at Ex- 
eter Academy, and was one of the originators of the Anthology 
Club ; Everett, whom Lafayette styled the young American 
Cicero, who left the pulpit for a distinguished career in public 
life ; and others who have been prominent in our annals. 

Besides Governors Hancock and Bowdoin and their families, 
Joseph Warren, Harrison Gray Otis, Madame Scott, Daniel 
Webster, John Coffin Jones, and many other distinguished 
Bostonians, have sat under the ministration of the pastors of 
Old Brattle Street. 

General Thomas Gage, whom some wit proposed to create 
Lord Lexington, Baron of Bunker Hill, on account of his dis- 
asters here, was well acquainted with Washington, having 



BRATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 125 

fought under Braddock at Fort du Quesne, where he (Gage) 
led the advance. "Washington, in July, 1775, became his 
adversary. Another of these intimacies existed between Gen- 
eral Charles Lee and Burgoyne, who had served together in 
Portugal. 

Gage succeeded Hutchinson as governor, in 1774, when it 
was determined . by the Ministry to crush the rising spirit of 
rebellion in the Colonies. He was at first well received, but 
the course of events soon led to a wide separation between him 
and the people. After Lexington, Gage proclaimed martial 
law, offering pardon to all offenders except Samuel Adams and 
John Hancock. Bunker Hill followed, and the British general 
soon found himself shut up in the town. In October he 
resigned and returned to England, being succeeded by Howe. 
Howe, Clinton, and Burgoyne, all arrived in Boston in the Cer- 
berus, May 25, 1775. As they came up the harbor they met a 
packet outward bound, and Burgoyne hailed the master and 
inquired the news. Learning that Boston was closely besieged 
by the provincials, he demanded, "How many regulars are 
there in the town 1 " Being answered about five thousand men, 
he exclaimed, " What ! ten thousand peasants keep hve thou- 
sand King's troops shut up ; well, let us get in and we '11 soon 
find elbow-room." This name stuck to Burgoyne, and on a 
second visit to Boston, when the fortune of war had made him 
a prisoner, he landed at Charlestown Ferry, — where the bridge 
now is, — but was extremely annoyed by an old woman, who, 
perched on a neighboring shed, kept crying out, " Make way 
there, — elbow-room, — elbow-room." 

In 1768 Jolm Adams, the future president, but then a young 
barrister, took up his residence with Mr. Bollan in Brattle 
Square. The house was known as the White House. His son, 
John Quincy Adams, was then only a year old. In his diary 
Mr. Adams remarks that *' the town was full of troops, and 
through the Avhole succeeding fall and winter a regiment was 
exercised by Major Small directly in front of my house." On 
the night of the INIassacre ^Ir. Adams was passing the evening 
at the house of !Mr. Henderson Inches at the South End, where 



126 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

a club, of which Adams was a member, used to assemble. 
Thinking the alarm was for a fire, he snatched his hat and 
cloak, and went out to assist in putting it out. He did not 
reach the Town House until the affair was ended, and passed 
on, through the Httle alley we have taken in our route, to 
Brattle Street. The 29 th were drawn up in front of their 
barracks, and Adams had to pass along their ranks to reach 
his lodgings, but not a word was spoken on either side. At 
this time he lodged in Cole Lane, now Portland Street. 

Mr. Adams was elected to the General Court of Massachusetts 
in 1770, though laboring under some obloquy on account of 
his defence of Captain Preston. He has been called the father 
of our navy, as the act passed under Washington's administra- 
tion authorizing the construction of six frigates, was vitalized 
by him, while at a still earlier day, in the Continental Congress 
of 1775, he drew up a code of regulations for a navy, that has 
formed the basis for the government of that branch of the 
service. Ambassador to England and Holland, and finally 
Chief Magistrate, John Adams, by a coincidence, died on the 
same day as Thomas Jefferson, July 4, 1826. Mr. Adams was 
termed by Jefferson the " Colossus " of Congress. 

Before leaving Brattle Square and its vicinity, it must not 
be forgotten that this street, with Elm and Union, formed the 
great headquarters of the stages before the day of railways. 
Wilde's and Doolittle's were chief among the taverns for stage 
travel, and on a clear morning the air resounded with the 
crack of the whips and halloo of the drivers. The starting of 
the stages was always witnessed by a gaping crowd, and their 
diurnal passage over the country roads was an event to the 
dwellers along the route, scarcely equalled by the later advent 
of the iron horse. The Tony Wellers of the box were great 
men in the eyes of the stable-boys and country lasses. One at 
least among them has reached the eminence of M. C, while 
another presides over the traffic of a great railway. 

In exploring Dock Square, we find that the old Town Dock, 
from which its name is derived, flowed up to a point opposite 
the entrance of Elm Street, formerly Wing's Lane. On the 



BRATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 127 

brink of the Dock was a watch-house, and in the space 
formed by the junction of Korth (Anne), Union, and Ehn 
Streets was the Flat Conduit. This conduit was merely a 
reservoir of water, about twelve feet square, raised in the 
centre and sloping at the sides. It was covered with planks, 
and the platform served on Saturdays as a meal market. It is 
mentioned as early as 1657, and was constructed perhaps not 
long after the fire of 1653. Anne Street was originally Con- 
duit Street as far as Cross, and Union Street is described in 
1 732 as leading from the Conduit to the Mill Pond. 

Before Faneuil Hall was built — as early as 1 708 — the 
space it covers and which surrounds it was occupied as a 
market-place, and at the foot of Merchants' Row the Dock 
was crossed by a swing-bridge, in two equal parts. That part 
of the Dock lying west of Merchants' Row was tilled up about 
1780 ; it was known as the Market Dock. The lower section 
of the Dock was narrower, and is now covered by North 
]\Iarket Street. At the time of the improvement of this region 
by Josiah Quincy, in 1826, the Town Dock came up as far as 
the head of Faneuil Hall Market, or, as tliis name is now 
applied to the market in Faneuil HaU, we will say Quincy 
Market, which the popular will has cliristened it. On the old 
plans of 1738 the Town Dock was flanked by Woodmansie's 
wharf on the south, and by Borland's, Bridgham's, Hill's, and 
Pitt's wharves on the north. The Mill Creek, connecting the 
Mill Cove with the Town Cove, emptied into the latter on a 
line with, and a little south of Blackstone Street. 

In the primitive order of things, it is apparent that the tide 
covered all the level ground in Dock Square, as far as the bot- 
tom of Brattle Street, and all east of Union Street from Creek 
Lane on the west. Between the Mill Creek and the Town 
Dock was a triangular tongue of land, or rather marsh. AU 
of the north side of the Dock seems to have been known at 
one time as the Fish Market. Shaw says, " The chief part of 
the town was built on the cove or bay which has since been 
called the Town Dock." The first paragraph in the town rec- 
ords establishes the fact that in 1634 this was the chief landing- 
place. 



128 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

The improvement by Mr. Quincy was the greatest enterprise 
of the kind that had been undertaken in Boston. By reference 
to Quincy's History, we learn that " a granite market-house, 
two stories high, 535 feet long, covering 27,000 feet of land, 
was erected at a cost of $ 150,000. Six new streets were 
opened, and a seventh greatly enlarged, including 167,000 feet 
of land, and flats, docks, and wharf rights obtained to the 
extent of 142,000 square feet. All this was accomplished in 
the centre of a populous city, not only without any tax, debt, 
or burden upon its pecuniary resources, but with large perma- 
nent additions to its real and productive property." This im- 
provement also facilitated the opening of Fulton and of Com- 
mercial Streets, the latter making direct communication north 
and south instead of a long detour through !N"orth Street. S. 
S. Lewis was the projector of Commercial Street. 

Quincy Market, though not at once pecuniarily successful, 
soon became so. It is a monument to Mr. Quincy's genius and 
perseverance. Any other man would have succumbed to the 
obstacles he had to encounter, but he pressed on to the accom- 
plishment of his purpose. He invested the sluggish town with 
new life, and brought into practical use a new watchword, — 
Progress. At a very early hour Mr. Quincy was in the habit 
of mounting his horse, and riding through every quarter of the 
town, remedying evils or projecting new enterprises. 

The interior of the market has always been a scene of attrac- 
tion to visitors, and a model of its kind. Admirable system 
and order prevails. Here are haunches that would have caused 
the royal sword to leap from its scabbard, as when 

"Our second Charles of fame facets, 
On loin of beef did dine ; 
He held his sword pleased o'er the meat, 
* Rise up, our famed Sir-loin ! ' " 

Here are sausages in festoons ; roasting pig that would have 
made Charles Lamb's mouth water ; vegetables in parterres, 
and fruits from every clime. Here one may have fish, flesh, 
fowl, or good red herring. The countenances of those who 
seek their daily food before the stalls is a study. The poor 



BllATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 120 

woman lingering over the coveted joint for beyond her slender 
purse is jostled by the dame who gives carte blanche to her 
purveyor. Wliat quantities we eat ! Sydney Smitli thought 
he had eaten wagon-loads more than was good for him. The 
open mouths of the gazers upon this scene of plenty have 
been likened to so many graves yawning for the slaughtered 
herds. 

Yet plenty has not always prevailed in the town. Putnam 
came with his drove of sheep to succor the inhabitants in 1774. 
In 1775 the Town Bull, aged twenty years, was killed and sold 
for the use of the generals and officers, at eighteen pence sterling 
per pound. Perhaps Gage, in Brattle Square, with his subordi- 
nates, Howe, Clinton, and Burgoyne, sat in gloomy conclave 
over a tough morsel of the patriarch, hoping vainly that " good 
digestion might wait on appetite." 

Faneuil Hall Market was begun in 1824, the corner-stone 
laid in 1825, and was finished in November, 1826. It occupied 
a little more than two years in building. North and South 
^larket Streets were built at the same time, and are respectively 
sixty-five and one hundred and two feet wide. The difference 
in the mdth of these streets, and in fact the position of the 
market itself, is due to the refusal of the heirs of Nathan Spear 
to part with their estate on any terms. By the increased Avidth 
of South Market Street, the difficulty was overcome, as the city 
then took the estate for the street with a clear legal conscience. 
Codman's, Spear's, Bray's, and the Avharves extending between 
Xorth ^Market and State Streets towards the present line of 
Commercial Street, were reclaimed in this great improvement, 
and converted into solid ground, and Chatham Street was laid 
out. 

Benjamin Faneuil, Jr., was in business in Butler's Bow in 
1767, which, before the improvements, entered ]\Ierchants* 
Eow between Chatham and State Streets. This Benjamin 
was the nephew of Peter, of noble memory, and was one of 
the consignees of the tea shii)s whose cargoes were emptied 
into the dock in 1773. 

As a merchant, John Hancock had a store at the head of 



130 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

what is now South Market Street, or, as it was then described; 
" Store No. 4, at the east end of Faneuil Hall Market. A 
general assortment of English and India Goods, also choice 
Newcastle Coals, and Irish Butter, cheap for Cash. Said Han- 
cock desires those persons who are still indebted to the estate 
of the late Hon. Thomas Hancock, Esq., deceased, to be speedy 
in paying their respective balances to prevent trouble." '" 

In Winthrop's Journal, a market is mentioned as set up by 
order of the court in March, 1634. Its locality is not men- 
tioned, but it is believed to have been on the site of the Old 
State House. In 1734 the town located three markets, and 
appropriated £ 300 towards their erection. They were situ- 
ated in North Square, Dock Square, and on the present ground 
of Boylston Market. A bell was rung daily at sunrise to give 
notice of the opening, and one o'clock p. m. was the hour of 
closing. On the 4th of June the three markets were opened 
for the first time, and the people and dealers flocked in great 
numbers to tliem. 

The market in Dock Square was always the most fre- 
quented. Faneuil Hall, of which we shall presently relate the 
history, did not long provide sufficient accommodations. At 
the time of Mr. Quincy's improvements there was a row of 
sheds, for the sale of vegetables, on the north side of Faneuil 
Hall, in what is now the street. The neighboring streets were 
often obstructed with market-waGrons, while farmers were com- 
pelled to occupy Union Street with their stands, nearly to Han- 
over, and Washington, almost to Court Street. In 1819 a 
number of citizens erected what was known as the City Mar- 
ket, in the large building at the foot of Brattle Street, now 
used as a furniture warehouse by Blake and Alden ; the upper 
part was occupied as a Gallery of Fine Arts. The General Court 
refused to incorporate the proprietors, and the city subsequently 
rejected the offer of the market as a donation. 

Retracing our steps along North Market Street, the first 
object of interest is the Triangular Warehouse, which stood on 
the border of the town dock, opposite the swing-bridge, until 

* Boston Evening Post, December 25, 1764. 



BKATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 



131 



taken down in 1824 to make room for the sweeping changes 
then inaugnrated. Its site is now covered by the buildings at 
the head of North Market Street, with a moiety in Merchants' 
liow and Chnton Street. 

This singular old building was built of brick, of two stories, 
on a stone foundation, with a tower at each angle ; a tower also 
rose from the centre of the roof Each of these towers termi- 
nated in a pointed roof of slate, and were capped with a stone 
ball set in lead, except the middle tower, which had a wooden 
one. The strength with wliich it was constructed, with the 
quaint architecture, led for a time to the supposition that it 
was intended for a Custom House, or some other similar 
purpose, but no 
proof being 
found to support 
the belief, the 
opinion became 
general that it _ 
was erected by 
London mer- 
chants for a 
warehouse, about i 
1700. ^ 

One side of 
the Triangular 
AVarehouse fronted Eoebuck Passage, which has become, by 
transition, the extension of Merchants' Eow. The passage, 
named from a' tavern called the Roebuck, within its limits, 
Avas a tortuous defile a hundred feet in length, varying in widtli 
from thirteen to twenty feet, but was still the main tliorough- 
fare from the market north and south. The tavern itself was 
a building with a projecting upper story, and was a notorious 
resort of doubtful repute. It was the scene of at least one 
deadly affray. Eichard AVhittington, a descendant of the Lord 
Mayor of London, is said to have been the builder. 

Clinton Street was one of the new avenues which arose out 
of the chaos of this region. The Old Mill Creek crossed it at 




TRIANGULAR WAREHOUSE. 



132 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 

the j^oint where now stands the New England House, the last 
of the Boston coffee-houses. The hotel is built on made land. 
The course of the creek was altered at this point, so as to flow 
through the lower part of Chnton Street into the harbor, instead 
of following its old channel into the dock. To etfect tliis plan, 
the city bought GoA^ernor Eustis's Avharf, through which the 
creek found an artificial outlet. Blackstone Street has taken 
the jDlace of the creek. 

Opposite the north side of Faneuil Hall is a little alley, and 
on the alley, with a front on North Street, is an old landmark. 
This lofty wooden building of five cramped stories was the Old 
Boston Museum, established in 1804, by Philip Woods. After 
a removal to another location in Dock Square for a short time, 
the Museum returned to its old stand. In 1822 the New 
England Museum fell heir to the greater part of the collection. 
The building fronted originally on Market Square, and was 
sometimes designated the Market Museum. The timbers are a 
foot square ; the chambers scarcely allow a tall man to stand 
erect, whilst the staircase in its almost perpendicular ascent is 
extremely suggestive of broken bones. 

At the corner formed by North Street and Market Square 
was another of those ancient structures now extinct among us. 
It was known as the "Old Cocked Hat," from its fancied 
resemblance to an article of wear now as obsolete as itself. 
Under the western gable, fronting Dock Square, was the date 
of 1680. The building was of wood, covered with plaster on 
the outside, with which were mixed fragments of glass bottles. 
Various ornamental figures were traced upon this rough surface. 
On two sides, south and southwest, the water once flowed, and 
in digging not far from here some years ago to settle a disputed 
boundary question, the capstan and ring-bolt of the old wharf 
were uncovered within the present sidewalk. 

The " Old Cocked Hat " was of two stories, the upper pro- 
jecting, and is supposed to have been built the year folloA\'ing 
the destructive fire of August 3, 1G79, which began about 
midnight and raged till midday of the 4th. A hundred and 
fifty dwellings and warehouses, with several ships and their 



BRATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 



133 




ANCIENT HOUSE IN DOCK SQUARE. 

cargoes, were consumed. Tliis old house was at first a dwell- 
ing, and for a time, according to Snow, the principal apothe- 
cary's shop of the town was kept there. It was taken down 
in July, 18G0. 

The fame of Faneuil Hall is as wide as the country itself. 
It has been called the " Cradle of Liberty," because dedicated 
1 )y that early apostle of freedom, James Otis, to the cause of 
liberty, in a speech delivered in the hall in March, 1763. 
Somewhat of its early history has appeared in the account of 
the town government. Its walls have echoed to the voices of 
the great departed in times gone by, and in every great public 
exigency the people, with one accord, assemble together to take 
counsel within its liallowed precincts. Though much too small 
for popular gatherings of the present day, its long use for this 
purpose, with the many glorious associations that cluster around 
it, still mark it as the centre from which the will of the people 
of Boston should proceed. 

The Old ^larket-house, mentioned as existing in Dock Square 
in 1734, was demolished by a mob in 173G-37. There was 



134 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



contention among the people as to whether they would be 
served at their houses in the old way, or resort to lixed locali- 
ties, and one set of disputants took this summary method of 
settling the question. Pemberton says, this mob were "dis- 
guised like clergymen." 

In 1740, the question of the Market-house being revived, 
Peter Faneuil proposed to build one at his own cost on the 
town's land in Dock Square, upon condition that the town 
should legally authorize it, enact proper regulations, and 




FANEUIL HALL BEFORE ITS ENLARGEMENT. 



maintain it for the purpose named. Mr. Faneuil's noble offer 
was courteously received, but such was the division of opinion 
on the subject, that it was accepted by a majority of only seven 
votes, out of seven hundred and twenty-seven persons voting. 
The building was completed in September, 1742, and three 
days after, at a meeting of citizens, the hall was formally 
accepted and a vote of thanks passed to the donor. Hon. 
Thomas Gushing, the moderator of the meeting, the selectmen, 
and representatives of the town, were appointed a committee, 
" to wait upon Peter Faneuil, Esq., and in the name of the 



BRATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 135 

town, to render him their most hearty thanks for so bountiful 
a gift." Besides this, the town voted that the hall should be 
called Faneuil Hall forever ; to procure Mr. Faneuil's portrait 
to be placed therein ; and later, to purchase the Faneuil arms, 
carved and gilt by Moses Deshon, to be fixed in the hall. 

The first architect of Faneuil Hall was John Smibert the 
painter ; Samuel Euggles was the builder. It was not at first 
intended by Faneuil to build more than one story for the 
market, but with noble generosity he went beyond his original 
proposal, and built another story for a town hall. The original 
size of the building was forty by one hundred feet, just half 
the present width ; the hall would contain one thousand per- 
sons. At the fire of January 13, 1763, the whole interior was 
destroyed, but the town voted to rebuild in March, and the 
State authorized a lottery in aid of the design. The first meet- 
ing after the rebuilding was held on the 14th March, 1763, 
when James Otis delivered the dedicatory address. In 1806 
the Hall was enlarged in width to eighty feet, and by the 
addition of a third story. 

But little is left of the original building, but a rule has been 
laid down for such as may be curious to trace the old outline : 
'' Take a northeast view of the Hall, — there are seven wm- 
dows before you in each story, — run a perpendicular line, from 
the ground, through the centre of the middle window to the 
top of the belt, at the bottom of the third story, carry a 
straight line from that point nearly to the top of the second 
window, on the right, in the third story. That point is the 
apex of the old pediment. From that point draw the corre- 
sponding roof-line down to the belt, at the corner; and you 
have a profile of the ancient structure." 

A grasshopper, which still decorates the vane, made by that 
cunning artificer Deacon Shem Drowne, was long thought to be 
the crest of the Faneuils ; especially as a similar insect adorned 
the vane of the summer-house in Tremont Street. But the arms 
were extant not many years ago on some of Peter Faneuil's 
plate, in the possession of his descendants, and disproved this 
theory. No better reason has been assigned for the adoption 



136 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 




hEW TWCIIL H^LL, AMTH QlI^C\ MARKET 

of the grasshopper than that it was an imitation of the vane 
of the Eoyal Exchange, London. 

Curiously enough, the first pubhc oration dehvered in Faneuil 
Hall Avas a funeral eulogy, pronounced on the death of Peter 
Faneuil, INIarch 14, 1743, by Master Lovell of the Latin School. 
In the course of his^ address the orator said, " May Liberty 
always spread its joyful wings over this place. May Loyalty 
to a king under whom we enjoy that Liberty ever remain our 
character." Master Lovell, himself a tory fugitive when Boston 
was freed from the British occupation, did not dream of the ful- 
filment of his wish — divested of its dependence on a king — 
when he uttered it. 

Faneuil Hall was illuminated, by a vote of the town, on the 
news of the repeal of the Stamp Act, and the selectmen were 
requested to make provision for drinking the king's health. 
During the winter of 1775-76 the British officers, under the 
patronage of General Howe, fitted the hall into a very neat 



BRATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 137 

theatre, devoted chiefly to performances ridicuHiig the patriots. 
The Sunday after the battle of Lexington there was a meeting 
held in the hall by the citizens to agree with General Gage on 
regulations under which the people might leave the town. The 
strictness with which the Sabbath was then observed testifies 
to the importance the subject had assumed. Gage communi- 
cated with the meeting tlu'ough Captain Sheriff, his aide-de- 
camp, the proposal that the inhabitants might be allowed to 
depart after surrendering their arms. ^lany of the old provin- 
cial officers, men who had served at Louisburg, were present, 
and viewed with deep chagrin the proposition to give up the 
arms they had worn in many honorable campaigns. Gage had 
tlie l:>ad faith afterwards to render his promise nugatory by ap- 
pointing a Town Major, to whom applications were made. This 
officer discriminated against those whose attachment to the 
patriot cause Avas known. 

In Faneuil Hall is the rendezvous of the " Ancient and Hon- 
orable Artillery Company." Its original designation was the 
" Military Company of the INIassachusetts " ; it was also styled, 
at different periods, " The Artillery Company " and " The Great 
Artillery." The name " Ancient and Honorable " was not ap- 
plied until 1720; no military organization can dispute its title 
to he the oldest band of citizen-soldiery in America. The com- 
jmny was formed in 1637, and at once applied for an act of in- 
corporation, which was not granted, the rigid Puritans fearing 
to estal^lish a privileged military body which might, on occasion, 
subvert the government. The Praetorian Band of the Pomans 
and the Templars of Europe were cited to enforce this Avise 
determination. The company was, nevertheless, permitted to 
choose a captain and make use of the common arms in their 
exercise. A chai-ter was granted in 1G38. 

Captain Keayne, the first commander, has been noticed. The 
charter prohibited any other military company from parading 
on the days appointed by law for the " Artillery " ; and this ex- 
clusive privilege was maintained against the "AVinsloAv Phies," 
in 1808, when that company assembled in Faneuil Hall on one 
of the field-davs of the " Ancients." 



138 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

It does not appear what the uniform of the company — if 
any was adopted — was at the beginning. Blue and buff was 
supposed to be the dress in 1738. By 1770 the corps stood 
arrayed in gold-laced hats, blue coats, buif under-clothes, and 
silk stockings, with white linen spatterdashes. In 1772 an 
order was issued that wigs and hair should be clubbed. Some 
few changes were made in 1787, when shoulder-straps, to secure 
the cross-belts, and a black garter, worn below the knee, were 
adopted ; the hair to be worn en queue. Chapeau-bras and 
cockade, with black plume, eighteen inches long, took the 
place of the old cocked-hat in 1810, with red facings for the 
coat instead of buff. 

The company was assembled by beat of drum, which re- 
mained the practice for many years. On days of parade the 
drummer passed through the principal streets beating the rapj)el 
vigorously. The colors were displayed on these occasions from 
Colonel Daniel Henchman's bookstore, at the corner of King 
Street and Old Cornhill, — the vacant area which then existed 
under the Old State House serving the corps for a rendezvous 
until the town provided an armory in Faneuil Hall. In 1 743 
halberds were used by sergeants, and pikes and half-pikes by 
the captain and lieutenant. 

The roll of the " Ancients " presents a host of names distin- 
guished in Colonial and Eevolutionary history. To enumerate 
them would be impossible within our limits. The old custom 
of " Artillery Election," when the old officers retire and the 
new are commissioned by the governor, is still scrupulously 
observed. The " Election Sermon " is still preached as in the 
days of Colman and Sewall. 

During the reception of Count D'Estaingin September, 1778, 
a superb entertainment was given him at Faneuil Hall, at which 
five hundred guests were present. 

When Lafayette was in Boston, in 1784, the merchants gave 
him a dinner at Faneuil Hall. At every toast thirteen cannon 
were discharged in Market Square by Major Davis's train of 
Artillery. The picture of Washington had been concealed by 
drapery, and when in the course of the banquet it was un- 



BRATTLE SQUARE AXD THE TOWN DOCK. 139 

veiled, the Marquis rose to liis feet, clapped his hands, and 
seemed deeply moved as he gazed on the features of his old 
commander. The audience was not less affected than the dis- 
tinguished guest. The Marquis was fond of identifying him- 
self with the Americans, and in this way won their love and 
admiration. Being asked by a lady on one occasion if the black 
cockade was not the color worn by the Continental officers, he 
replied : " Yes, madame, but we added the white out of com- 
phment to the French when they joined us." 

The folio Aving anecdote is related by Mr. Dean, in his memoir 
of Daniel Messinger : — 

"An amusing incident occurred once at a dinner given Prince 
Jerome Bonaparte in 1804. It is stated on the authority of Josiah 
Quincy, that after dinner Colonel Daniel Messinger sang the favorite 
old song of ' To-morrow.' As the audience joined in the chorus of 
' To-morrow, To-morrow,' a cloud came over the countenance of the 
Prince, and taking his next neighbor by the arm he exclaimed, ' To 
Moreau ! To Moreau ! Is it a song in honor of General Moreau ? ' 
He was quickly undeceived, and smiled when he found that no one 
but himself was tliinking of the great rival of his brother." 

President Jackson visited Boston in June, 1835, accompanied 
by Secretaries Cass and Woodbury, and Mr. Poinsett of South 
Carolina. The occasion was the opening of the new Dry Dock 
at Charlestown, and the docking of the frigate Constitution. 
The President held a pul^lic reception in Faneuil Hall. Com- 
modore Hull, ]\Ir. AVinthrop, and Mr. Van Buren were present. 
The Vice-president was described as a tight, snug, compact, 
vigorous-looking little body, with a bright, keen, twinkling 
little eye and winning smile. Both he and jNIr. Woodbury were 
very bald. Mr. Cass Avas not present. 

The visit of the Prince de Joinvillo to Boston in Xovember, 
1841, was rendered memorable by a grand ball given in his 
honor at Faneuil Hall. The Prince had come over to Xew 
York in La Belle Poule frigate, the same that conveyed the 
ashes of the great Xapoleon from St. Helena to France. The 
towTi was all agog for the expected visit of the Prince, and when 
he appeared at the ball simply attired in a blue naval uniform, 



140 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

the enthusiasm was extreme. The Prince wore no decoration, 
except the ribbon of the Legion of Honor, and devoted himself 
assiduously to the ladies to whom he was introduced, Tlie old 
hall was beautifully decorated with flags and devices specially 
designed for the occasion. 

Alexander Baring, Lord Ashburton, negotiator with Mr. 
Webster of the treaty which bears his name, was welcomed to 
Boston in Faneuil Hall, August 27, 1842, by Mayor Chap- 
man. From him Ashburton Place takes its name. As one of 
the great house of Baring Brothers, he resided some time in 
the United States, He and Webster were on terms of close 
intimacy. 

The Earl of Elgin, while governor-general of Canada, visited 
Boston to attend the jubilee upon the OiDening of the Grand 
Trunk Railway. He was accompanied by a numerous staff, 
and received the honor of a grand ball at Faneuil Hall. 
Among the officers who accompanied him, none attracted more 
attention than those of a Highland regiment, — stalwart, bare- 
legged fellows in bonnet, kilt, and tartan. 

Among the attractions to the old Cradle of Liberty, the por- 
traits which adorn tlie walls are not the least, and it is to be 
regretted that some which have hung there and would now be 
highly prized were either destroyed or spirited away by vandal 
hands. Shortly after the death of Mr. Faneuil, Governor Shir- 
ley informed the selectmen that he had received his Majesty's 
picture through the hands of the Duke of Grafton, and soon 
after the likeness of George II. was hung in the hall. The 
town had solicited the portraits of Colonel Barrc and General 
Conway, their able defenders on the floor of Parliament. The 
request was complied with, and the pictures sent over in 17G7, 
but they disappeared from the hall after the British evacuated 
the town. 

The west end of the hall is covered with paintings. The 
large picture by Healey, representing Webster replying to 
Hayne in the Senate, first attracts the view. The portraits of 
John Hancock and Samuel Adams are by Copley, as is that 
of Joseph Warren. The Adams has been called Copley's mas- 



BRATTLE SQUARE AND THE TOWN DOCK. 141 

ter-piece, and was painted for Governor Hancock, but on the sale 
of his eti'ects became the property of S. A. AVells, and finally of 
Adam W. Thaxter, who presented it in 1842 to the city. The 
full length of Peter Faneuil is a copy of a smaller painting in 
the Historical Society's possession. It is by Colonel Henry Sar- 
gent, and was presented by Samuel Parkman, as was also the full 
length of AVashington, by Stuart. The portraits of Eufus Choate 
and Abraham Lincoln are by Ames, that of Governor Andrew by 
Hunt. General Henry Knox is by Gilbert Stuart. Commo- 
dore Preble, one of the only two he ever sat for, is probably a 
Stuart. The superb clock was the gift of the school children. 

Corn Court took its name from the corn market which was 
once held on the south side of the Town Dock. Entering its 
recesses, unknown to half the town, we fmd the oldest inn in 
Boston, now called the Hancock House. This may well have 
been the site of Samuel Cole's old inn. Altered in some re- 
spects, the building presents a front of brick, with wooden side- 
walls. A dilapidated sign, bearing the weather-stained features 
of Governor Hancock, retains a feeble hold of its fastenings. 

This was the old Brasier Inn, at which Talleyrand sojourned 
when in Boston in 1795. He afterwards became the guest of 
Mr. William Lee, in Water Street. Mr. Lee's residence, a 
two-story wooden house, stood near the site of the new Post- 
Office, and was removed not many years ago. Talleyrand, the 
future prime minister and evil genius of Napoleon, was ban- 
ished from France, and made his way to the United States, 
accompanied by the Due de la Eochefoucauld Liancourt and 
M. de Beaumetz. At the same time Robespierre proscribed 
him in France, Pitt also proscribed him in England. He went 
first to Philadelphia, where Congress was sitting, and entered 
freely into the political questions then being agitated. He was 
intimate with Jefferson, and intrigued with the opposition to 
prevent the accomplishment of a treaty between England and 
the United States. On his return to France, after an absence 
of little more than a year, he was accused of having worn the 
white cockade in America. He ^v^ote from the United States 
to Madame de Genlis : " I think no more of my enemies ; I 
occupy myself in repairing my fortune." 



142 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Talleyrand visited tlie studio of Gilbert Stuart. The latter, 
who was a great physiognomist, after an attentive examination of 
the features of his visitor, remarked to a friend, " If that man 
is not a villain, the Almighty does not write a legible hand." 
Talleyrand was no friend to the United States, as was soon 
manifest in the capture of our vessels by the French cruisers 
when he came into power, which resulted in a quasi state of 
war with the French Eepublic. 

M. de Talleyrand returned to Europe in an American vessel, 
commanded by a man named Vidal, to whom he took a great 
liking. He signalized his arrival in Hamburg by an amour, 
which, in its deplorable results, made the language of Stuart 
prophetic. His adventure with the young and beautiful Baron- 
ess de S , a pupil of Madame de Genlis, is a matter of 

history. The unfortunate lady, better known as " Cordelia," 
being deserted by Talleyrand, put an end to her life with a 
small American penknife, the gift of her lover, which she 
thrust into her heart. Upon her table was found an open note 
directed to M. de Talleyrand. The contents were as follows : — 

" I have burnt all your letters. They did no honor to my memory 
nor to your heart. You are the author of my death ; may God for- 
give you, as I do! "Cordelia." 

The brick building now occupied as a mne store, on the 
south side of Faneuil Hall, is one of the antiquities of the 
neighborhood, having stood for nearly a century unmoved 
amid the mutations that have swept over that locality. 

Opposite the southeast corner of Faneuil Hall was located 
the Custom House under the State government, James Lord, 
Collector. Hon. James Lovell was Collector in 1789. 

Dock Square was the scene of one of the incidents of the 
Conscription Riots of 18G3. The mob, after a fruitless assault 
upon the gun-house in Cooper Street, proceeded in this direction 
with intent to supply themselves with arms from the stores of 
the dealers in weapons. They were so promptly met, however, 
by the police force, which behaved with signal bravery on this 
occasion, that no serious results followed, and, the military soon 
arriving on the ground, the riot fell still-born. 



FKOM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 143 



CHAPTER V. 

FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 

Tlie North End. — Boston Stone. — Painter's Arms. — Louis Pliilippe. — 
Union, Elm, and Portland Streets. — Benjamin Franklin's Residence. — 
The Blue Ball. — Lyman Beecher's Cliurch. — Benjamin Hallowell. — 
Green Dragon. — Pope Day. — St. Andrew's Lodge. — jMill Pond. — Cause- 
way. — Mill Creek. — North Street. — Sir D. Ochterlony. — Eastei-n Stage - 
House. — Cross Street. — The Old Stone House. — New Brick Cliurch. — 
The Red Lyon. — Nicholas Upshall. — Edward Randolph. — North Scjuare. 

— Sir H. Frankland. — Major Shaw. — Pitcairn. — Old North Church. — 
Cotton, Samuel, and Increase IMather. — Governor Hutchinson. — General 
Boyd. — Fleet Street. — King's Head Tavern. — Bethel Church. — Father 
Taylor. — Hancock's Wharf. — Swinging Signs. — First Universalist Church. 

— First Metliodi.st. — New North. — Ship Tavern. — Noah's Ark. — Salu- 
tation Taveni. — The Boston Caucus. — The North Battery. — Trucks and 
Truckmen. 



WE now invite the reader to accompany us into the Xorth 
End, a section of the town which became settled after 
the more central portion we have been traversing. It contains 
more of its original features than any other quarter ; many of 
its old thoroughfares are but little altered, and retain their 
ancient names. As for the buildings, as we plunge deeper into 
this region, we shall find some of 
those old structures that still link 
us to the olden time. Weather- 
stained, tottering, and decrepit as 
they are, not many years will 
elapse before the anticpiary will 
seek in vain for their relics. 

Imbedded in the rear wall of a 
building wliich fronts on Hanover 
Street, and presents its westerly 
side to Marshall Street, is the Boston Stone. Of the thou- 
sands who daily hurry through this narrow way, the greater 




144 LAXDMAEKS OF BOSTOX. 

part are unconscious of its existence. The stone bears the 
date 1737, and seems to have got its name from the famous 
London Stone, which served as a direction for the shops in its 
neighborhood, as did the Boston Stone for its vicinity. It was 
brought from England about 1700, and was used as a paint- 
mill by the painter who then occupied a little shop on these 
premises. The spherical stone which now surmounts its fellow 
was the grinder, and was for a time lost, but was discovered in 
digging the foundation for the present edifice. The larger stone 
is only a fragment of the original, which was spht into four 
pieces when placed in its present position. Its capacity is said 
to have been nearly two barrels. 

Following the custom of the times, the painter placed in the 
front of his house the coat of arms carved in wood now in the 
Hanover Street front, from which liis dwelling was known as 
the "Painter's Arms." Though it bears the date of 1701, the 
coat of arms, representing probably the guild of painters, ap- 
pears in excellent preservation. In 1835 the old " Painter's 
Arms " was taken down, and the tablet transferred to the build- 
ing which replaced it. 

Opposite to Boston Stone is an antiquated but well-preserved 
brick building standing quietly aloof from the neighboring and 
busy street. This building makes the corner — on Creek Lane 
— of a row of three or four venerable brick structures extend- 
ing towards Blackstone Street. These were built shortly after 
the peace by John Hancock, and are to this day called " Han- 
cock's Row." Times were depressed, and Hancock's bounty gave 
employment to many deserving and needy artisans. The row 
at first extended to the creek whose waters have long since 
ceased to flow. 

The building first mentioned was the office of Ebenezer 
Hancock, brother of the governor, and deputy paymaster-gen- 
eral of the Continental army. Here, when the town was under 
the government of Greene and Heath and Gates, a sentinel 
paced before the door, never, we may believe, deserted by the 
needy officers of the Continental line. The lower floor has 
groaned beneath the weight of the French crowns sent us by 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 145 

his Most Christian Majesty, our excellent ally, brought over 
by the fleet of D'Estaing. 

How the poor fellows' eyes must have sparkled when they 
received their long arrears in King Louis's bright silver 
crowns ! The order of Gates or Heath was now a talisman to 
unlock the strong-box of the paymaster, and for once it was 
not empty. Paymaster Hancock occupied the house also as his 
residence. 

AVilliam Pierce was a Avell-known barber at Boston Stone in 
1789, ajid he continued to follow his calling until nearly a 
hundred years old. His shop was a sort of exchange for the 
gossip current at the North End, and was frequented by many 
celebrated residents of that locality. It was Pierce's boast that 
he had shaved Franklin, and he related that Franklin told him 
he was born at the corner of Union and Hanover Streets. He 
had also preserved a tradition that the Hancocks formerly 
resided in Hatters' Square. John Xorman, also known as an 
engraver of some repute, had his printing-office at Boston Stone 
in 1784. 

At the corner of IMaTshall and Union Streets lived, in 1798, 
James Amblard, a tailor. Amblard, a Frenchman by birth, 
had the honor of being the host of the Due de Chartres, after- 
wards Louis Philippe, during his residence in Boston, to which 
allusion has been made. AVhile awaiting funds from Europe, 
Louis found himself obliged to resort to teaching the French 
language here, until ho and his brothers were relieved by remit- 
tances from their mother. Tlie Duke returned to London in 
1800, and resided at Twickenham. According to ^Mr. Xason, 
the future king of France was intimate witli the father of Wm. 
B. Fowle, Esq., the educator, and often jdayed chess with him 
of an evening, presenting on his departure a set of chessmen 
still preserved in the family. 

L^nion Street was named from the British Union. Creek 
Lane reminds us of the mill creek to whicli it led. Cole Lane, 
or Cold Lane, has taken the name of Portland Street, and at 
first extended only as far as the jNIill Pond. Elm Street was 
Wing's Lane. Elm, Hanover, and Salem Streets were all 
7 J 



146 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

widened under the town government ; before this they were 
the merest lanes. 

Emerging from Union Street into Hanover, we stand on the 
corner which disputes with Milk Street the honor of being the 
birthplace of Benjamin Franklin. The student who patiently 
investigates the claims of the rival localities will be likely at 
last to exclaim with Mercutio, — 

"A plague o' both the houses ! " 

Franklin's own statement, as given by himself to a person 
worthy of credit, was that he was born on this now famous 
corner, while other evidence goes to contradict it. That his 
early youth was passed here is certain. Here he practised the 
art of making tallow candles for his father, and employed his 
leisure in throwing rubbish into the neighboring Mill Pond. 
From here he wended his way through Hanover and Court 
Streets to the Latin School, and, after his father's business 
became distasteful to him, to bis brother's printing-office in 
Queen Street. 

The sign of Josias Franklin, father of Benjamin, was a Blue 

Ball, suspended by an 
iron rod from the front 
^ • — T..^^ ;:;;^ of his shop, which stood 
at the southeast corner 
of Hanover and Union 
Streets. Before the streets 
were numbered, and while 
the buildings were scat- 
tered, it was the universal 
custom among the inhab- 
TTiR nuvE BALL. itauts to dcsiguatc their 

shops by some emblem. Thus we find the " Heart and Crown," 
"Three Nuns and a Comb," and "Brazen Head" in Cornhill, 
" Three Doves " in Marlborough Street, " Tun and Bacchus " 
and " Three Sugar Loaves and Canister " in King Street. This 
last was thus distinguished from the "Two Sugar Loaves" 
in Cornhill : — 





FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 147 

" Oft the peasant with inquiring face, 
Bewildered, trudges on from i)hice to place ; 
He dwells on every sign with stupid gaze, 
Enters the narrow alley's doubtful maze, 
Tries every winding court and street in vain, 
And doubles o'er his weary steps again." 

The old house was quite small and of two stories, to which 
a third was added in later times. It was q ^ ^ 

partially destroyed by fire in 1858, and "'*^ 

in the same year the city took the build- 
ijig to widen Union Street. When the 
widening of Hanover Street took place, 
the old site was partially taken for that 
street. In the same way, by the plan of 
cutting off wholly from one side of the 
street, a number of quite noted landmarks 
disappeared. It was the intention of the 
owners to have removed the Franklin 
building to another location, but it was '''^^ °" ^''""^^ ^''^"^'• 
found impracticable. Two relics of it are, however, preserved. 
The Blue Ball is in the possession of General Ebenezer W. 
Stone of Boston, and from the original timbers was made a 
chair which was presented to the Mechanic Charitable Asso- 
ciation. 

There are two original portraits of Franklin in the Public Li- 
brary, — one by Duplessis, presented by Hou. Edward Brooks ; 
the other by Greuze, presented by Gardner Brewer. 

Corresponding with No. ,97 Hanover Street, once stoi^l the 
church of Dr. Lyman Beecher, the eminent divine, fatlier of 
Henry Ward Beeclier. The church was erected in 1826, and 
consumed by fire on the night of the 31st December, 1829. 
Eeport says, a quantity of liquor was found by the firemen in 
the cellar. It was built of rough granite, had a central tower, 
and in general appearance was not unlike tlie old Brattle Street. 
After the destruction of tlieir house, the society united in build- 
ing the church in Bowdoin Street, wliich was completed in 
June, 1831. Dr. Beecher was tlie first pastor, having been set- 
tled in March, 1826, but in 1832 he removed to Cincinnati. 



148 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

The society was originally formed from members of Park Street, 
the Old South, and Union Churches. 

The Hanover Ch-iirch stood on the site of Benjamin Hallow- 
ell's old residence, which was ransacked by the -same mob that 
pillaged Lieutenant-Governor Hutchinson's house in August, 
1765. Mr. Hallowell was a comptroller of customs, and as 
such, regarded with special hatred by the pojDulace. The mob 
destroyed or carried oif everything of value, including a small 
sum of silver. Hallowell then removed to an elegant mansion 
at Jamaica Plain, which was afterwards confiscated. One of 
his sons, B. Carew, became a distinguished British admiral. 
Hon. John Coffin Jones also lived on the Hallowell estate. 
Captain Henry Prentiss, a Revolutionary soldier and one of 
the Tea Party, lived also on this spot. He was a distinguished 
merchant and ship-owner. 

The Green Dragon Tavern in Union Street was the greatest 
celebrity among all the old Boston hostelries. It stood facing 
towards the street, on a little alley running from Union Street 
around by the rear, but by the increased width of the street 
the site now abuts upon it, and is marked by a freestone tablet 
set in the Avail witli a dragon sculptured upon it in bas-relief.*' 
Tliis was the sign of the old tavern, which was on the west 
side of Union, a short distance from Hanover Street. In early 
times it was the property of Lieutenant-Governor Stoughton, 
and was used as a hospital during the Revolution. It was a 
two-story brick building with pitch roof. From above the en- 
trance projected an iron rod on which was crouched the fabled 
monster of antiquity. 

William Stoughton, Lieutenant-Governor from 1692 to his 
death in 1701, was one of the " Council of Safety" which 
deposed Andros. As Chief Justice of the Court he has 
acquired a fearful celebrity in connection v/ith the witchcraft 
trials. 

We have seen that Warren, John Adams, Revere, and Otis 
were neighbors. The former was the first Grand Master of the 
first Grand Lodge of Masons who held their meetings in the 

* Many think the tablet incorrectly placed. 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NOKTII BATTERY. l-iO 

Green Dragon. The rest of the patriots came here to plan or 
DO confer. How much '' treason " was hatched under this roof 
will never he known, hut much was unquestionahly concocted 
within the walls of the masonic lodge. It is upon their record 
that they adjourned on account of the memorable Tea Party, 
for which they furnished no inconsiderable number. 

Paul Revere says : " In the fall of 1774 and winter of 1775 
I was one of upwards of thirty, chiefly mechanics, wlio formed 
ourselves into a committee for the purpose of watching the 
movements of the British soldiers and gaining every intelli- 
gence of the movements of the tories. We held our meetings 
at the Green Dragon Tavern. This committee were astonished 
to find all their secrets known to General Gage, although every 
time they met, every member swore not to reveal any of their 
transactions except to Hancock, Adams, AVarren, Otis, Church, 
and one or two more." The traitor proved to be Dr. Church, 
who was afterwards arrested for treasonable correspondence 
with the enemy. 

The early meetings of the iNLissachusetts Charitable Associa- 
tion, organized in 1795, were held here and at Concert Hall. 
It was always a favorite resort for the mechanics of the North 
End. AVhen the convention was sitting which was to consider 
the adoption of the Federal Constitution, a great mass meeting 
of Boston mechanics assembled in the Green Dragon, which 
gave so emphatic an expression in favor of its acceptance that 
Samuel Adams said, " If they want it, they must have it." 

One of the old customs long ol)served in Boston was the 
celel)ration of Pope Day, as November 5th, the anniversary of 
the Gunpowder Plot, was called. A bitter animosity existed 
between the North and South Enders, whose line of demarca- 
tion was the Mill Bridge on Hanover Street. Each section had 
its procession and its jiope, and when the rival parties met, a 
battle ensued with fists, sticks, and stones, and one or the other 
of the popes was captured. The North End pope was never, 
it is said, taken but once. 

Pope Day was a saturnalia. A stage was erected on wheels, 
on which was placed a figure of the pope seated in a chair. 



150 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Behind this was a female scarecrow called Nancy Dawson, with 
effigies of Admiral Byng and the Devil hanging from a gallows. 
Much ill-blood arose from these conflicts, the effects of which 
remained nntil the anniversary came round again. Governor 
Hancock, considering this foolish rivalry prejudicial to the pa- 
triot cause, used every effort to subdue it, but without effect. 
He at last gave a supper at the Green Dragon Tavern, which 
cost him $ 1,000, to which he invited all the leading men of 
both parties, and invoked them in an eloquent speech to lay 
aside their animosity for their country's sake. The appeal was 
successful, and the rival parties shook hands before they sepa- 
rated. From that time Pope Day ceased to agitate the warring 
factions. '^ 

The Green Dragon, also known as the " Freemason's Arms," 
is specially noted in the annals of Masonry in Boston. It was 
purchased by St. Andrew's Lodge before the Eevolution, and 
remained in their possession more than a century. The lodge 
was organized under a charter from the Grand Lodge of Scot- 
land in 1756, and was chiefly composed of residents of the 
North End. There were several lodges in the British regi- 
ments that landed in Boston in 1768 and 1774, and St. An- 
drew's Lodge united with them in organizing a Grand Lodge. 
The first Lodge of Freemasons met in Boston July 30, 1733. 
It was the first in the Colonies, receiving authority from Lord 
Montague, Grand Master of England, Daniel Webster styled 
the Green Dragon the Headquarters of the Eevolution, a name 
to which it has an undoubted claim. In the Green Dragon the 
Sandcmanians held their first meetings in America. In later 
times it was kept by Daniel Simpson, the veteran musician. 
On the corner where now stands the Baptist Church building 
was formerly a brewery. 

The Mill Pond, or Cove, mentioned in the Introduction, once 
covered all the tract embraced within North and South Margin 
Streets, being divided from the sea on the northwest by the 
Causeway, now Causeway Street. The station-house of the 
Boston and Maine Railway stands in the midst of this Mill 

* General Sumner's Reminiscences. 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. l.jl 




FIRST BAPTIST CHUKCH IN 1S53. 



Pond, wliile tlie Lowell, Eastern, and Fitcliburg occupy sites 
beyond the Causeway rescued from the sea. The high ground 
sloping away from Green and Leverett Streets once marked the 
boundary of the Cove in that direction, whilst tlie eastern mar- 
gin, reaching to Distill-house _ 
Square, included all of Haymar- 
ket S(iuare. On the northern 
shore the water covered Endicott 
Street, reaching to Prince, bcilow 
Thacher, and penetrated to the 
rear of Baldwin Place, almost to 
Salem Street. When the Second 
Baptist Church was situated in 
Baldwin Place, candidates for 
ba[)tism were immersed in the 
rear of the church. Before En- 
dicott Street was laid out, about 
183G, over a part of what was 
known as the " Old Way," Prince Street was the thoroughfare 
to Charlestown. The Mill Pond thus embraced an area as large 
as the Common. 

The origin of the Causeway was in a footpath of the Indians 
over a more elevated part of the marsh. One Mr. Crabtree 
raised and widened this primitive path into a dam to retain the 
waters of the pond. 

In 1643 the town granted Henry Simons and others a tract, 
including the Mill Pond and flats west of tlie Causeway, on 
condition of their building one or more corn-mills, and bridging 
the ISIill Creek at Hanover and North Streets. ^lills were ac- 
cordingly erected at the west end of the creek called the South 
Mills, and at either end of the Causeway. The Xorth ^lills 
stood very near the junction of Thacher and Endicott Streets. 
These were a grist-mill and a saw-mill ; a chocolate-mill stood 
at a little distance beyond in after times. 

In 1804 the grant came into possession of the ^lill Pond 
Cor])oration. The town in 1807 released the original obliga- 
tion to maintain the mills and bridges forever, and the work of 



152 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

filling commenced, Copp's and Beacon Hills furnishing tlie ma- 
terial for this purpose. Tlie process of tilling occupied twenty- 
five years before it was fully completed, and during that time 
the Mill Pond was the receptacle for all the rubbish from the 
streets. 

The Mill Creek, whose outlet into the Town Dock has been 
traced, was doubtless in some form an original feature of the 
peninsula. The want of an early map is keenly felt in any 
effort to establish the structure of the original surface. Win- 
thro]) says, the north part of the town " was separated from the 
rest by a narrow stream which was cut through a neck of land 
by industry." Hanover Street was this neck, and all north of 
the creek was an island known in times past as the " Island of 
Boston." An order of the court in 1631, levying £ 30 on the 
several plantations for clearing a creek and opening a passage to 
the new town, supports the view that a small water-course 
existed here which finally became a means of communication 
between the Town Dock and Mill Cove. 

The creek, at first furnishing a supply of water for the tide 
mills, became in process of time a canal, with walls of stone, 
wide and deep enough to permit the passage of boats and even 
sloops from the harbor on the east to the river on the west. As 
such, it was an extension of the Middlesex Canal, incorporated 
in 1753, and of which Loammi Baldwin was engineer. The 
boats entered the canal at Chelmsford on the Merrimack, and 
passed on to the wharves on the east side of Boston, a distance 
of thirty miles. Blackstone Street, named from the founder of 
Boston, is built upon the bed of the canal. 

The old Mill Bridge thrown over Hanover Street was rebuilt 
in 1G8G ; was taken up in 1793 and replaced by a stone arch 
over which the pavement was continued. At North Street 
where the creek crossed was a drawbridge, from wliich this 
street was sometimes called Drawbridge Street. The i)assage 
of vessels being discontinued, the creek, which had an average 
width of twenty feet, was planked over here. 

The North End was but three streets wide in older times. 
These were North, Hanover, and Salem Streets. The former, 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 153 

besides a number of aliases already given, was known along its 
course first as the Fore, or Front Street, and also as Anne, Fish, 
and Sliip Street. Hanover Avas Middle Street from the Mill 
Creek to Bennet Street, beyond which it was North Street. 
Salem was called Back Street as far as Prince, and at one 
period Green Lane. All these retain their original names in 
part, except North, which has ever enjoyed a reputation not 
inferior to the Seven Dials of London or Five Points of New 
York, Crowded at one time through its entire length with 
brothels and low dram-shops, Anne Street took a new name 
before its character was improved. 

''And on the broken pavement here and there, 
Doth many a stinking sprat and herring lie ; 
A brandy and tobacco shop is near, 
And hens, and dogs, and hogs are feeding by, 
And here a sailor's jacket hangs to dry. 
At every door are snnburnt matrons seen, 
Mending old nets to catch tlie scaly fry ; 
Now singing shrill, and scolding eft between ; 
Scolds answer foul-mouthed scolds ; bad neighborhood, I ween." 

Laid out along the original water-front, wharves extended 
from Anne Street into the harbor. Over these Commercial 
Street is now built. In colonial times Anne Street bore a 
better reputation, and many of the magnates of the town found 
their residence in it. It was widened in 1859 and greatly im- 
proved, and is now for some extent devoted to business pur- 
poses. 

At the lower corner of North and Centre Streets, formerly 
called Paddy's Alley, stands an old two-story brick house. 
The front wall has apparently been rebuilt, but the remainder 
of the structure bears the genuine stamp of antiquity. This 
was the home of Sir David Ochterlony, Bart., son of a royal- 
ist, and a Bostonian by birth. 

It was not those alone who served under their country's flag 
that gained celebrity during the llevolutionary War. Among 
those who entered the British service were seven young Bosto- 
nians, who arrayed themselves against their native land, and 
finally became generals or admirals in that service. Their 



154 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

names are General John Coffin, Thomas Aston Coffin, Bart., 
Eoger Hale Sheaffe, Bart., Admiral Sir Isaac Coffin, General 
Hugh McKay Gordon, B. Hallowell, and Sir David Ochterlony. 

The latter, before whose home we are pausing, was a Latin- 
School boy, went to India at eighteen, served in the Indian 
wars, and was at the great conflict of Delhi. For his services 
in India Ochterlony was made a major-general in 1814 and 
baronet in the year following. The name indicates his Scotch 
origin. Unlike his famous companions, Sir David did not hnd 
himself compelled to serve against his countrymen. 

At a little distance from this corner we hnd in Centre Street 
the old brick stable of the Eastern Stage-House, the headquar- 
ters for many years of stages bound to Portland and the east- 
ward. It was kept by Colonel Ephraim Wildes, and ranked 
with Earl's, Doolittle's, and other principal rendezvous of this 
kind. 

The entrance on N'orth Street was by a large arch, through 
which you passed into a court-yard of large area. Descending 
from the coach you entered the main building by a flight of 
steps, where good cheer and hearty welcome always awaited the 
tired traveller. 

Cross Street, in 1708, extended from the Mill Pond to the 
sea. At the corner of Anne was the Cross Tavern ; its name 
was, like Middle and Back, descriptive. It was an important 
thoroughfare in former times, but is chiefly interesting to the 
antiquarian on account of the Old Stone House that stood be- 
tween Hanover and North, about midway on the east side. The 
interest which attached to it was chiefly on account of its age, 
though conjecture has assigned to it the uses of a jail and gar- 
rison house under the old colony. It was built of rough stone, 
with the large brick chimneys on the outside, and stood for 
about two hundred years. It was very early described as the 
'' Stone House of Deacon John Phillips in the cross street." 
Tradition has ascribed to it the first place of meeting of the 
town overseers, and Pemberton vouches for the finding of loop- 
holes in the walls while it was under repair. None of these 
garrison houses, so commonly erected in the scattered villages 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 155 

for defence against the Indian foe, are known to have been built 
in Boston. The Old Stone House was removed in 18G4, and 
a part went to make the foundation of an East Boston church. 
Savage's Police Record gives the following description of the 
Old Stone House, which he says, "at tirst consisted of two 
wings of uniform size joining each other and forming a right 
angle. Each wing was forty feet long, twenty feet wide, and 
two stories high, the wings fronting the south and west. There 
was one door in the end of each wing on the first story, and a 
single circular window in the second story over the doors ; there 
were also two circular windows in each story of each wing in 
front, but neither door nor window in either wing in the rear. 
The foundation walls were four feet thick or more ; the walls 
above ground were two feet in thickness, and built entirely of 
small quarried stones, unlike anything to be seen in this neigh- 
borhood, and were probably brought as ballast from some part 
of Europe." 

Passing the Old Hancock School, now a police-station, and 
Board Alley, so narrow a drunken man could not fiill to the 
right or left, we arrive at Ilichmond Street, formerly Bridge 
Lane, and according to some authorities the old Beer Lane. 

The " Xew Brick " or " Cockerel " Church was first built on 
this spot in 1721, and originally came out of the Xew Xorth 
Church. The figure of the cock was placed upon the first vane 
in derision of Rev. ^Ir. Thacher, Avhose Christian name was 
Peter. A fierce controversy at the ordination of iNFr. Thacher 
as pastor of the New North Church caused the division which 
led to the formation of the society of the Xew Brick. Dr. 
Eliot says, " that when the cock was placed upon the spindle, 
a merry fellow straddled over it and crowed three times to com- 
plete the ceremony." This church went by the name of the 
" Revenge Church," until Dr. Lathrop took charge and healed 
the lireach with the parent church. 

The Xew Brick, a name given to distinguish it from the Old 
Brick in Cornhill, originally fronted upon Hanover Street, but 
now stands sidewise upon that street and facing toAvards Rich- 
mond. It is one of the very few Boston chui'ches occupying 



156 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



their original sites. In 1845 it was rebuilt of brown stone, and 
pulled down in 1871 during the widening of Hanover vStreet. 
The historic rooster is seen on Paul Revere's picture of 1768. 
It is now, after having breasted the storms of a century and a 
• half, safely dej^osited within the new church. 

Passing through Richmond to North Street, we find ourselves 
in a region where even that veteran antiquary, Jonathan Old- 
buck, would have felt at home ; 

"Where winding alleys lead the doiiMM way ; 
The silent court and opening square explore, 
And long perjDlexing lanes nntrod before." 

At our left hand the ground rises towards the triangular en- 
closure known as Xorth Square. In front of us, on the north- 
east corner of North and liich- 
mond, is a brick building to which 
tradition has long attached the im- 
portance of standing on the site of 
the first Colonial Custom House, 
under Edward Randolph and his 
successors. Evidence is wanted to 
support this statement, — an im- 
portant one in the investigation of 
the old landmarks ; but the tra- 
dition is firmly fixed in the minds 
of old residents of the North End, 
and is generally credited. When 
the old building was taken down, 
about twenty years ago, many a pilgrimage was made to it and 
the wish expressed that its walls could speak. 

Randolph was Collector in 1681, but the " Bostoneers," as 
Hutchinson calls them, refused to recognize his office. He had 
been appointed " Collector, Surveyor, and Searcher " in New 
England. His authority was treated with contempt by Gover- 
nor Leverett, who sat with his hat on while the King's letter 
of appointment was being read before the Council. His public 
notification of the establishment of his office posted at the Town 
House was torn down by an officer of the Court. In 1682, 




NEW BRICK CHURCH. 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 157 

fearing they liad gone too far in resistance to the King's com- 
mands, the Court estaljHshed a Custom House, but the h)ss of 
tlic Colonial Charter soon followed. 

The removal of the papers belonging to this department at 
the evacuation of Boston leaves few materials wherewith to 
establish its history, and these are connected by imperfect links. 
The old building was long known as the "Eed Lyon Inn," 
prominent among the early North End taverns. The tablet in 
the front of the building bears the initials of the Wads worths, 
former proprietors. The old " Ked Lyon " gave its name to 
Upshall's wharf below, which became lied Lyon Wharf The 
ordinary itself was one of the oldest, and was kept by Nicholas 
Upshall probably as early as 1G54, when he had a number of 
soldiers billeted upon him, and certainly in 1G6G. He was one 
of the first to feel the rigor of the persecution of the Quakers. 
He was banished, imprisoned, and at length in his old age died 
a martyr to the ftiith which, amid all his sufferings and hard- 
ships, he seems stoutly to have upheld. He was in Boston as 
early as 1637, and then owner of all the property on the north- 
east side of liichmond Street from Hanover Street to the water. 
His first banishment was for an attempt to bribe the keeper of 
Boston jail to give food to two starving Quaker women in his 
charge. Upshall was one of the first members of the Ancient 
and Honorable Artillery Company ; his remains lie in Copp's 
Hill Cemetery, and his friends the Quakers were not forgotten 
in his will. 

As little as North S(piare is known to the present generation, 
few localities can surpass it in the interest which attaches to the 
historic personages who have dwelt within its confined area. 
But our readers shall judge as we proceed. 

Standing before an entrance still narrow, the relics of demol- 
ished walls on our right show that the original opening was 
once even more cramped than now, and scarce permitted the 
passage of a vehicle. The point made ])y North Street reached 
considerably beyond the present curl)stone some distance into 
the street, both sides of which were cut off when the widening 
took place. This headland of brick and mortar, jutting out 



158 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

into old Fish Street as a bulwark to protect the aristocratic 
residents of the square, was long known as " Mountfort's Cor- 
ner," from the family owning and occupying it. It was the 
established custom of those early times to fix the limits of the 
streets from corner to corner. Thus Fish Street is described in 
1708 as "from Mountjoy's corner, lower end of Cross Street, 
northerly to the sign of the Swan, by Scarlett's Wharf." 

Opposite to us, reached by a little alley from the street, was 
the residence of Dr. Snow, the historian of Boston. AVhere 
we stand, a narrow passage opens at our left hand, through 
which, beyond the crazy tenements, we see the brick walls of 
the Second Church. Through this passage Governor Hutchin- 
son is said to have passed from his residence to the old church, 
a door having been constructed in the rear of that edifice ex- 
pressly for his excellency's convenience. 

Fronting the street and bounding upon this alley was the 
residence of Francis Shaw, father of Samuel Shaw, the Revo- 
lutionary soldier, and grandfather of Robert G. Shaw, the 
wealthy merchant and pliilanthropist. In this house were the 
quarters of the old Major of Marines Pitcairn, and Lieutenant 
Wragg of the same corps. Troops were scattered in detach- 
ments throughout the North End, a cordon extending from the 
works on Copp's Hill to the South Battery. North Square was 
the rendezvous for those nearest the battery, and Pitcairn 
appears to have been intrusted with the supervision of his 
quarter. 

Young Shaw, who became a major in the Continental army, 
served in the Revolution from the begiiniing to its close, first 
as a lieutenant in Knox's artillery, rising by successive grades 
to be a captain of artillery in 1 780. He was secretary of the 
officers who formed the Society of the Cincinnati, major and 
aide-de-camp to General Knox, his old commander, at the 
peace, and was appointed by him to a post in his bureau when 
secretary-at-war. In 1794 ]\Iajor Shaw received an appointment 
as consul to China from "Washington, and sailed for that country 
in the first American ship that ever set sail for those shores. 
On this voyage he died, and his epitaph may be seen on the 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 159 

family monument in Copp's Hill. The company of artillery 
attached to the Boston regiment gave to the Continental ser- 
vice upwards of forty young men, most of whom became dis- 
tinguished officers of that arm. 

A tradition is preserved that Wragg, the lieutenant of ma- 
rines, one day made some remark at the family board dispar- 
aging the "rebels," whereupon he was challenged by young 
Samuel Shaw. The interposition of Pitcairn, it is said, pre- 
vented a hostile meeting. 

Proceeding up the square, which still preserves its cobble- 
stone pavement, we pass a tottering, ruinous wooden building 
said to have been once in the family of Commodore Downes, 
and come to another somewhat fresher specimen of the same 
order. This was the habitation of Paul Revere, and his prob- 
able birthplace. From this house he gave the striking exhi- 
bition of transparencies on the evening of the anniversary of 
the Massacre. AVe have found Revere at his shop in Cornhill, 
and briefly alluded to his engraving on copper, his lirst efforts 
having been on silver plate. He also engraved the plates, 
made the press, and printed the paper money for the Provincial 
Congress at Watertown. The house has not altered in appear- 
ance in fifty years. 

On the other side the square stood the old Town Pump, in 
front of the present ]N'aval Rendezvous. One of the old town 
watch-houses was near at hand. 

Among the older families resident here were the Holyokes. 
The father of the celebrated President of Harvard was a re- 
spectable soap-boiler. 

AVithin the compass of a few rods we find buildings of 
undeniable antiquity, some extremely ruinous, with shattered 
panes and leaky roofs, while others, improved upon to suit 
more modern tenants, have the jaunty air of an old beau in 
modern habiliments. One patriarch stands at the corner of 
Sun Court and Moon Street. Its upper story projects after the 
fashion of the last century ; the timbers, which tradition says 
were cut in the neighborhood, are of prodigious thickness, 
while the clapboards are fastened Avith wrought nails. If the 



160 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

fathers of Boston had not huilt strongly, these relics would not 
now be left to us. Their chimneys were a marvel, and contain 
the materials for a good-sized modern dwelling. 

This narrow, contracted sj)ace was once the court end of the 
town. It was first called Clark's Square, from an old resident, 
and afterwards Frizell's Square. Where now is a brick block 
facing the square was built the Second Church in Boston, better 
known as the Old I^orth. This was the church of the Mathers, 
— Samuel, Increase, Cotton, and Samuel the son of Cotton. 
Built in 1G50, it was destroyed by fire in 167 Q, and rebuilt the 
next year. Both houses were of wood, and the latter edifice 
was pulled down in the winter of 1775-76 for fuel, as were also 
upwards of a hundred other wooden buildings. General Howe 
sanctioned the act. 

Dr. Lathrop says : " No records of the Old North Church 
exist for more than a year after the memorable 19th of April. 
At this time most of the churches in town were broken up, and 
the greatest part of the inhabitants went into the country. 
Wliile the pastor and members were dispersed, a number of 
evil-minded men of the King's party obtained leave of General 
Howe to puLL it down." The society then joined tne New 
Brick, which took the name of the Second Church. 

Cotton Mather, the son of Increase and grandson of John 
Cotton, is regarded as the most celebrated of the Boston clergy. 
A Bostonian by birth, he graduated with honor at Harvard, 
and was a scholar of high attainments. Mather was a prolific 
author, and his numerous works are valuable contributions to 
the early history of New England. He was a firm believer in 
witchcraft, and his name is identified Avith the persecution of 
the unfortunates who fell under the ban of suspicion. 

Samuel and Increase Mather were sons of Rev. Richard 
Mather, who was settled in Dorchester in 1636. Both were 
men of learning and high consideration. Increase received the 
first degree of D. D. conferred in America. He went to Eng- 
land as agent of the colony, and returned in 1692 with the. 
new charter. Unlike his son, he did not pursue the witchcraft 
delusion, which desolated so many homes and left an indelible 
blot upon our history. 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. IGl 

Cotton Mather lived on Hanover Street, in a house built by 
Cajitain Turcll. It was not far from the Cockerel Church on 
the oi)posite side of the street, and was afterwards occupied by- 
Master Harris of the North Grammar School. Samuel blather 
lived on tlie east side of Moon Street, about midway from Sun 
Court to Fleet Street, on the corner of what was formerly known 
as Moon Street Court. The house was demolished about 1832, 
and a tobacco warehouse erected on the site, which became 
afterwards a Catholic Church. Increase Mather lived on Xorth 
Street, near Clark, in a house afterwards used as a seamen's 
boarding-house. 

During the year 1676, when great scarcity prevailed, Dr. 
Increase blather procured from his friends in Dubhn a ship- 
load of provisions. Boston paid this debt of long standing 
with interest, when she sent by R. B. Forbes a ship laden with 
food for the starving in Ireland. 

The following version of the humorous pen photographs of 
the Boston clergy of 1774 is from Mrs. Crocker's memoir. 
There were two distinct productions, which appear somewhat 
intermixed in the published versions. The lines given here 
were the first to appear, and were attributed to Dr. Benjamin 
Church. They were the rage of the town : — 

" Old Mather's race will not disgrace 

Their iiohle pedigree, 
And Charles Old Brick * both well and sick 
t Will plead for liberty. 

Tliere 's puffing Pern, f who does condemn 

All Freedom's noble sons, 
And Andrew Sly, J who oft draws nigh 

To Tommy skin and bones. § 
In Brattle Street we seldom meet 

With silver-tongned Sam, || 
Who smoothly glides between both sides 

And so escapes a jam. 
There 's Penuel Puff, If is hearty enough, 

And so is Simeon Howard j 
And Long Lane Teague ** will join the league 

And never prove a coward. 

* Chauncy. f Pemberton. % Eliot. § Hutchinson. 

II Cooper. ^ Bowen. ** Moorhead. 

E 



162 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

There 's little Hopper,* if you think proper. 

In Liberty's cause so bold, 
And John Old North, f for little worth, 

Won't sacrifice for gold. 
Tliere 's puny John :}: from North Hampton, 

A meek mouth moderate man. 
And colleague stout, § who, without doubt, 

Is linked in tory clan." 

According to Mrs. Crocker, the residence of Samuel Mather 
in North Square was built by Cai3tain Kemble, who in 1673 
was condemned to stand in the stocks two hours for lewd and 
unseemly conduct in saluting his wife at the step of the door, 
on the Sabbath day, when he first met her after three years' 
absence. His daughter, Mrs. Sarah Knight, kept in the same 
house a school, said to have been the first writing-school in that 
part of the town, from 1701 till her death in 1708. Dr. Mather 
afterwards occupied the same premises. All three of the Mathers 
are interred in Copp's Hill. Mrs. Crocker, here referred to, was 
a granddaughter of Cotton Mather. It was she whom Frank- 
lin told that he was born at the Blue Ball in Union Street. 

On the corner of Garden Court and Prince Streets, formerly 
Bell Alley, was the residence of Sir Charles Henry Frank- 
land, who was Collector of Boston in 1741 under Governor 
Shirley. He was said to have been removed from this office 
for inattention to its duties. Sir Charles led a romantic and 
eventful life. On one of his official visits to Marblehead he 
met with the lovely Agnes Surriage, maid-of-all-work at the inn. 
The attachment he conceived for her appears to have been 
returned, though Sir Charles did not offer her marriage. 

" The old, old story, — fair and young. 
And fond, — and not too wise, — 
Tliat matrons tell, with sharpened tongue. 
To maids with downcast eyes." 

Sir Charles had a fine estate at Hopkinton, Mass., where he 
delighted to pass the time with his beautiful companion. Ee- 
turning to England, Agnes was made to feel the scorn of her 
noble lover's family, and the pair went to Portugal. They 
were at Lisbon during the great earthquake of November 1, 
* StiUman. + Lathrop. J Hunt. § Bacon. 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 163 

1755, in which Sir Charles, while riding out, was overwhelmed 
by the falling ruins. The faithful Agnes succeeded in reaching 
and rescuing the entombed baronet, and carried him bruised 
and bleeding to their apartments. For this act of heroism the 
poor Marblehead girl became Lady Frankland. She survived 
her lord, and resided, until the breaking out of the Revolution, 
principally on the estate at Hopkinton, when she returned to 
England. The following lines were addressed to Sir H. Frank- 
land on receiving the present of a box of lemons, by S. M. 
(supposed to be Samuel Mather), February 20, 1757 : — 

"You Icnow from Eastern India came 
The skill of making punch, as did tlie name ; 
And as the name consists of letters five. 
By five ingredients it is kept alive. 
To purest water sugar must be joined, 
With these the grateful acid is combined ; 
Some any sours they get contented use, 
But men of taste do that from Tagus choose. 
Wlien now these three are mixed Avith care, 
Then added be of spirit a small share ; 
And that you may the drink quite perfect see. 
Atop the musky nut must grated be. " 

The Frankland estate at Hopkinton is now owned by Eev. 
Mr. !N'ason, who has written a most interesting account of its 
former possessor. Sir Charles attended King's Chapel in 
Eoston. The house in which the baronet resided was built by 
"William Clark, for whom the square and wharf were named. 
He was contemporary with the elder Hutchinson, Faneuil, 
Belcher, and Hancock, who may be said to have controlled 
in their day the commerce of Boston. He was also a Council- 
lor of the Province, and a man of marked distinction in the 
affairs of the town. Clark, it is said, met with reverses in 
the French wars, losing forty sail of vessels, which so impaired 
his fortune and depressed his spirits that he died soon after. 
He was one of the original attendants at Christ Church, and 
is buried in Copp's Hill in a tomb on which is blazoned the 
family arms. 

The Clark-Frankland house was a monument of human ]iride. 
In all colonial Boston we have not met with its peer, and it was 



164 



LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 




SIR H. FRANKLAND'S HOUSE. 

without cloubt built to outvie that of Hutchinson, Clark's 
wealthy neighbor. A brick dwelling of three stories was, in 
itself, a unique feature for the period in which it was con- 
structed ; its solid brick walls were traversed by belts at each 
stage. The tiers of windows at either end of the front were 
narrower than the others, and opened upon closets that would 
have gladdened the eyes of modern housekeepers and put mod- 
ern architecture to the blush. The entrance door was low, a 
common fault in our old builders ; but what was unusual, the 
different flats or stories were ten feet in the clear. The dormer 
windows in the roof varied enough in form to break the mo- 
notony of the outline. 

Entering by the front on Garden Court upon a hall twelve 
feet wide, you were ushered into a reception-room, or saloon, at 
the right of the hall of entrance. You walked on a floor cu- 
riously inlaid with alternate squares of pine and cedar, much 
after the fashion in vogue at the present day. Exactly in the 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 165 

middle of the floor was a centre-piece of a yard sijuare, on wliicli 
the mechanic had exjDended his utmost skill. The pieces of 
variegated wood were beautifully interwoven around a shield 
bearing the family device, — a bar with three white swans. 
This was before the day of carpets, when floors were kept 
brightly polished, even by the poorer classes. 

The walls were wainscoted around and divided by wooden 
pilasters into compartments with panels, on each of which was 
painted armorial bearings, landscapes, or ruins. Similar panels 
in the wainscot were ornamented with various devices. A 
heavy moulding of wood, supported by the gilded capitals of 
the pilasters, enclosed the ceiling. One of the panels of this 
room bore an exact resemblance of the building, from a copy 
of wliicli our engraving is taken. 

The house was similarly finished Avith wooden pilasters in 
every story. Some of the mantels were exquisitely carved in 
imitation of fruit and flowers. There has been preserved a 
picture taken from a compartment built expressly for it into the 
wall, representing two children richly attired and of a tender 
age. Conjecture has been busy as to the authorship of this 
really fine woi% of art. It is evidently antecedent to Copley, 
and may have been from the pencil of Smibert. This relic, 
together with others, is in the possession of Eowland Ellis, Esq., 
of this city. 

After the death of the baronet, he gave the house to the 
widowed Lady Agnes, who resided in it for a time. It ulti- 
mately came into possession of the Ellis flimily, during whose 
occupancy the entrance was somewhat enlarged, and tlie old 
wooden fence replaced by one of iron. The native hue of the 
brick had been improved upon with yellow paint. The con- 
version of old B;ill Alley into an extension of Prince Street 
cut off a considerable portion of the building, and it was taken 
down. Mr. Cooper, the novelist, visited the Frankland house 
and examined it minutely before he wrote " Lionel Lincoln," in 
which the house is described as the residence of Mrs. Lochmere 
and located in Treinont Street. ^Mr. Cooper talks about the 
" salient lions " of the tesselated floor, into wliich a fertile im- 



166 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

agination converted the peaceful swans of the Clarks. It. 
should be observed that the coat of arms in Copp's Hill bears 
a leafless branch, and is otherwise different from the escutcheon 
of the floor. 

Bedford Webster, an old Boston apothecary, and father of 
John White Webster, the slayer of Dr. Parkman, also lived in 
the house we have been describing. 

Next to Sir Charles Frankland, on Garden Court, resided 
Thomas Hutchinson. Under his administration, as lieutenant- 
governor and governor, were enacted the most turbulent scenes 
that preceded the Revolution. By birth a Bostonian, his love 
for oflice led him at length into a position of antagonism with 
his countrymen. Bancroft describes him as sordid and ava- 
ricious, smuggling goods and using every means to put money 
in his purse. By his townsmen he was nicknamed " Stingy 
Tommy." He held at one time the offices of lieutenant-gover- 
nor, member of the Council, commander of the castle, judge of 
probate, and chief justice of the Supreme Court. Dr. Franklin, 
in 1772, obtained possession in England of some of Hutchinson's 
confidential letters, which he forwarded to this country. They 
showed that Hutchinson had advocated the most repressive 
measures by the home government. 

On the night of the 26th of August, 1765, during the Stamp 
Act troubles, the mob attacked and sacked the governor's ele- 
gant mansion, destroying his furniture, drinking his wine, and 
scattering the streets far and wide with the debris. The gover- 
nor and family escaped personal violence, but an irreparable 
injury occurred in the destruction of the valuable library and 
manuscripts, — for Hutchinson was a man of literary tastes and 
scholastic attainments. Hutchinson at first took refuge with 
his sister at the house of Dr. Samuel Mather in Moon Street. 
The mob, however, demanded his person, and he was compelled 
to retreat by a back way to the house of Thomas Edes, a baker, 
guided by little Hannah Mather, as she herself relates. Here 
he remained during the night, returning to his brother's house 
to breakfast. The next day he was compelled to open court 
without gown or wig, both having been destroyed by the mob. 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NOKTII BATTERY. 1G7 

The Massacre increased his unpopularity, although he appeared 
on the scene and censured the unauthorized and fatal action of 
Captain Preston. The destruction of the tea in December, 
1773, was followed in a few months by the governor's depar- 
ture for England. 

The governor's mansion-house has been minutely described 
by Lydia Maria Child in the " Rebels." The house was of 
brick, painted a neutral tint, and was ornamented in front with 
four Corinthian pilasters. One of the capitals of these is now 
in the Historical Library. The crown of Britain surmounted 
each window. The hall of entrance displayed a spacious arch, 
from the roof of which a dimly lighted lamp gave a rich twi- 
light view. The finely carved and gilded arch in massy mag- 
nificence was most tastefully ornamented with busts and statues. 
The light streamed full on the soul-beaming countenance of 
Cicero, and playfully flickered on the brow of Tulliola. The 
panelling of the parlor was of the dark, richly shaded mahog- 
any of St. Domingo, and ornamented with the same elaborate 
skill as the hall just quitted. The busts of George III. and 
his young queen were placed in front of a splendid mirror, with 
bronze lamps on each side covered with beautiful transparencies, 
one representing the destruction of the Spanish Armada, the 
other giving a fine view of a fleet of line-of-battle ships drawn 
up before the Eock of Gibraltar. On either side of the room 
were arches surmounted with the arms of England. The library 
was hung with tapestry, representing the coronation of George 
II., interspersed with the royal arms. The portraits of Anne 
and the Georges hung in massive frames of anti(pie splendor, 
and the crowded shelves were surmounted with l)usts of the 
house of Stuart. In the centre of the apartment stood a table 
of polished oak. The gardens of the old mansion extended 
back to Hanover and to Fleet Streets. In 1834 the building 
was taken down, and ceased to be a noted attraction of the 
Xorth End. Governor Hutchinson received a pension and was 
reimbursed for his ])ecnniary losses, but died at last, it is said, 
of a broken heart. On l^ope Day Hutchinson's effigy was often 
exhibited with two faces. 



1G8 LANDMAK'KS OF BOSTON. 

Tlio Ilutcliinson ][(m.s('- was l)uilt iibout 1710 by Tliomas 
Hutcliiiison, iailicr of the governor, who wuh born in it the 
year followiiii;-. The estate was entailed to tlie inalo lieirs, l)ut 
was eonliseated iuul sohl for a mere song. Tlie ])i"eniises after- 
wai'ds iKM'iune tli(! ])r()perty of WilHani Little, at which time 
Mrs. ('liild visited tliciii. 

(Jeiicral flohn 1*. Doyd also lived in the Hutchinson house. 
lie had been in tlie service of the native East Indian princes, 
witli a force raised and e(iui})i)ed by liimself. Keturning to the 
United States, he, I'e-entered the army as colonel of the 4th 
iid'antry, and commanded at Fort Independence when tlie em- 
bargo of I (SOI) was laid. (Jeneral l>oyd distinguished himself 
greatly at 'rijjpe-canoe, Williamsburg, and Fort (Jeorgci during the 
campaigns ol" I <S 11 - 1 .'}. He was naval officer of Boston in 1830. 

F'lecit Stre(!t, formerly Scarlett's Wharf Lane, is another of 
tliose names l)y which the IJostonians loved to testify their love 
for (.)hl London. It is an old street, bearing this name in 1708. 
Lrom the lowi^r (Mid projected Scarlett's Wharf, now a })art of 
EastiM'ii Av(MiU(^, while from the junction of Fleet and North 
the latter aneiiuitly took the name of Ship Street, to its terminus 
at Lattery Wliai-f, from the ship-yards that lined its course. 

The " King's Head," another inn of " y^ Olden tyme," wasat 
the northwest corner of Fleet and North Streets, by Scarlett's 
AVliarf. It belongs to Uu) lirst century of the settlement ; was 
burnt in 1G91 and rebuilt. James Davenport kept it in 1755, 
and his widow in 1758. The site was long a bakediouse kept 
l)y doseph Austin. This neighborhood must bear olf the palm 
for inns, being, before the construction of Long AVliarf, the 
chief comnienual centre of the town. 

In North S(|uai'e were l)an'acks ior British troops at the time 
of the battle of Lexington. These tr()0])s \vv\v. mustered in the 
s((uare the night of the exi)edition, and sentinels, posted at all 
iUi) entrances, turned the citizens from the s])ot. The ])repai"a- 
tions for this affair were so s(U',retly conducttul that Gage lio])ed 
his intentions would escajH; discovery until the blow was struck. 
No cbanges were made in the disposition of the troojis, except 
to detach the grenadier companies. Dr. Lathrop, the pastor of 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BxVTTERY. 1G9 

the Old North, occupied a wooden building elected on the site 
of his old church after its demolition, in front of which were 
some handsome elm-trees destroyed by the gale of 181;"). 

The Bethel Church, which stands on the east side of North 
Square, was long the scene of the labors of Father E. T. Tay- 
lor, the eloquent Methodist preacher. His parishioners were 
the sailors that found themselves in port for the time being, 
and having himself followed the sea, Father Taylor was pecu- 
liarly fitted to preach to the seafaring class. His discourses 
were filled with graphic illustrations from the language of the 
ocean, and went straight to the comprehension of his hearers. 
Frequently he would have his audience wrought up to the 
highest pitch of excitement by some graphic picture. On one 
occasion a rough, weather-beaten mariner became so interested 
in the preacher's wonderful portrayal of the impending destruc- 
tion of a gallant vessel, that, forgetful where he was, he ex- 
claimed, — " Let go your best bower ; nothing else will save 
you." Father Taylor quickly turned the interruption to good 
purpose. He was chaplain to the frigate sent with supplies to 
the famishing Irish, and spoke in Cork and Glasgow. A 
daughter married Hon. Tliomas Russell, Collector of Boston. 
Father Taylor lived in the building at the corner of Prince 
Street, erected on the Frankland estate. 

In 1676, November 27, happened the greatest fire that had 
occurred in the towii up to tliis time. It broke out early in 
the morning near the Bed Lyon, and consumed forty-tive dwell- 
ings, the Old North Meeting-House, and several warehouses. 
The wind blew with great violence, carrying flakes of fire a(*ross 
the river and endangering Charlestown. Hubbard, in his His- 
tory of New England, says the fire occurred " through the 
carelessness of a boy called up to work very early in the morn- 
ing, who falling asleep, as was said, the candle set the house on 
fire." A cliange of wind from soutlieast to south, with a co- 
pious rain, arrested the flames at last. Increase ^Nlatlier's dwell- 
ing was burned in this fire, wlii(;h swept over the district now 
eml)raced within Bichmond, Hanover, and Clark Streets to the 
water side. 



170 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 

Clark's Wharf, subsequently Hancock's, was the most noted 
in the early history of the town, but was gradually rivalled by 
Long Wharf. It now coincides with the north side of Lewis's 
Wharf, although it originally formed no part of it. Thomas 
Hancock was the principal proprietor in 1761, owning seven 
eighths, as appears by an original statement of the income for 
that year. This wharf formerly opened into Fish, now Is^orth 
Street, and John Hancock's warehouses were upon it. 

In June, 1768, John Hancock's sloop Liberty arrived from 
Madeira loaded with wine. As she was lying at Hancock's 
Wharf, says Drake's History, Thomas Kirk the tidewaiter came 
on board, and was followed by Captain John Marshall, who 
commanded Hancock's ship, the London Packet, with five or 
six others. These persons confined Kirk below until they had 
removed the wine from the ship, of which no entry was made 
at the Custom House. The next morning the master of the 
sloop entered, it is said, a few pipes of wine, and made oath it 
was all he brought. It was resolved to seize the vessel, and 
Joseph Harrison, collector, and Benjamin Hallo weU, comptroller, 
repaired to the wharf and afiixed " the broad arrow." Appre- 
hensive of the mob which had collected on the wharf, the 
sloop was moored under the guns of the Eomney frigate. 

The exasperated people now turned upon the officers, and 
beat and maltreated them so that Mr. Harrison was for some 
time confined to his bed, while his son, Richard Acklom, who 
was not present in any official capacity, was very roughly used. 
Hallowell and Irving, inspectors, fared no better. The mob 
broke the windows of Mr. John Williams, inspector-general, 
and also those of Mr. Hallowell's house, and finished by drag- 
ging the collector's boat to the Common, where they burnt every 
fragment of it. The reveuue officers retired after this affair to 
the Castle, where they remained until the arrival of the troops 
in October. 

On the 4th of July, ominous day to British rule, the 38th 
regiment landed at Hancock's Wharf, and marched to the Com- 
mon and encamped. When the British retreated from the 
town they scuttled a new ship of 300 tons then lying at this 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 171 

wliarf, and left behind about 1,000 bushels of salt and 3,000 
blankets. 

Opposite the head of Hancock's Wharf, which we remind 
our readers once extended to the present !N"orth Street, was 
the Xorth End Coffee House kept in 1783 by David Porter, who 
advertised that he had taken the Coffee House, where " gentle- 
men shall be entertained in a genteel manner." Tliis was the 
flither of David Porter of renown, and grandfather of the pres- 
ent Admiral David D. Porter. The elder Porter was himself 
an old ranger of the main, having commanded the private-armed 
vessels Aurora and Delight in the Revolutionary War. At the 
peace he took the Coffee House, located at one of the most im- 
portant wharves of the town, but soon removed to Baltimore, 
where he engaged in trade. The Coffee House was occupied in 
1789 by Robert A-Vyre, distiller, and was for some time known 
as the Philadelphia Coffee House. The same house was after- 
wards the dwelling of Jonathan Amory, and later, of Colonel 
John ]\Iay. It had, however, a prior importance, having been 
built and inhabited by Edward Hutchinson, brother of Thomas. 

David Porter, the hero of the Essex, was born, it is said, in 
Clmrter Street. He entered the navy as midshipman in 1798, 
and fought his way to a captaincy in 1812. He was in the 
Constellation when she captured L'Insurgente ; first ofhcer in 
that busy little craft the Enterprise before Tripoli ; of the frigate 
New York, under Rodgers ; and of the Philadelphia, under Bain- 
bridge, when he became a prisoner for eighteen months. He 
sailed from New York in the Essex, thirty-two guns, in July, 
1812, and soon captured the British sloop Alert of twenty guns. 
Going around to the Pacific he annihilated the British whale- 
fishery, and captured the Nocton packet with £ 1,100 sterling 
on board, without finding a cruiser to molest liim. Blockaded 
by the British ships Phoebe and Cherub in Valparaiso, he at- 
tempted to get to sea, but losing some of his spars by a sudden 
squall, was forced to anchor. Here he maintained a bloody and 
determined resistance until his ship was on fire and incapable 
of fighting, when his flag was haided down. Porter afterwards 
commanded the jNIexican navy, and fiUed the post of minister 
from his native country to Turkey. 



172 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Eeturning through Fleet Street to Hanover, we find that the 
use of swinging signs, and carved figures for tlie shop fronts or 
houses of entertainment is by no means as unusual as has been 
supposed. To be convinced of this, it is only necessary to walk 
over the district we are describing. Jack is represented in 
every conceivable attitude. We are in no danger of losing our 
reckoning, for quadrant or sextant are pendent from every cor- 
ner, while a jolly tar with spyglass to his eye forever scans the 
neighboring shipping. Female heads, with features as weird as 
those of the famed lady of the Eed Rover, gaze from the en- 
trance of some ship artisan, while figures of Yenus, Hebe, or 
Mary Ann start forth as if in the act of leajoing from the 
painter's window to the pavement below. 

The First Universalist Church was at the corner of Xorth 
Bennet and Hanover Streets. It was a wooden building erected 
by seceders from the Old JN'orth, with Eev. Samuel Mather for 
their pastor. After the decease of Mather, in 1785, the house 
passed by purchase into the hands of the Universalists. The 
first pastor of the society was the Eev. John Murray, the father 
of American Universalism, who, it is said, was greeted with a 
shower of stones when he first attempted to preach in Boston. 
While the building stood, it was the last of the old wooden 
churches, but after ninety-six years of service it was succeeded by 
the brick edifice built in 1838, now a Baptist Seamen's Bethel. 

The brick chapel, on the north side of North Bennet Street, 
and only a few j^aces from Hanover, was the second house of 
worship of the Methodists in Boston. They first occupied a 
small wooden structure in Methodist Alley, now Hanover Ave- 
nue. The society, which has now such numerical strength in 
the land, had, it is asserted, its beginning among the British 
soldiers who arrived in 1768, a few of whom were Metliodists. 
In 1772 Mr. Boardman, colleague of Fillmore, the first Metho- 
dist preacher sent to America by Wesley, formed a small society, 
which soon dissolved. In October, 1784, Eev. William Black, 
of Halifxx, preached in the Sandemanian Chapel, on Hanover, 
near Cross Street, and in the Second Baptist Church. The 
building in Methodist AUey was dedicated in May, 1796, and 



FROM BOSTON STOXE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 173 



continued to be used by the society until September, 1828, 
when the North Bennet Street Chtapel was dedicated. 

A distressing accident occurred at the laying of the corner- 
stone of this chapel. The floor gave way under the pressure of 
the great number of people attending the ceremony, and precipi- 
tated the living mass into the cellar beneath. No lives were 
lost, but many received serious injuries. 

The famous eccentric preacher, Lorenzo Dow, occasionally 
preached in the little church in Methodist Alley. He was ex- 
tremely theatrical in his manner, but an effective speaker. In 
tliis small house the preacher might almost shake hands with 
his hearers in the front seats of the gallery. 

The Xew North Church is one of the monuments still pre- 
served in the North End. Seventeen substantial mechanics 
formed the nucleus of this, the ..^ .^ .. : 

Second Congregational Society 
in tliis part of the town. In 
1714 they erected a small 
wooden building at the corner 
of Clark and Hanover (North) 
Streets, " unassisted by the more 
wealthy part of the community 
except by their prayers and good 
wishes." This house required 
enlargement, in 1730, to accom- 
modate its increasing congrega- 
tion; and in 1802 was superseded 
by the present edifice. In 1805 
a bell from the foundry of Paul Eevere was placed in the tower. 
John AVeT)b was the first minister, the two Mathers assisting at 
the ordination. Within a few years the church lias been 
moved back to conform to the increased width of the street, 
and is now used by the Catholics. 

The installation of Eev. Peter Thacher, in 1719, as Mr. 
"Webb's colleague, was attempted to be prevented by the minor- 
ity opposed to him, who assembled at the house of Thomas 
Lee, in Bennet Street, next the Universalist meeting-house, 




NKW NORTH CHURCH. 



174 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

resolved to resist the progress of the minister and the council 
which met at Mr. Webb's, on the corner of North Bennet and 
Salem Streets. A crowd gathered and matters looked serious, 
when Mr. Webb led his party out by a back way to the church, 
thus out-manoeuvring the rival faction. The house of Dr. 
Eliot, of the New North, is still standing. It is next but one 
to the north corner of Hanover and Tileston Streets, is of wood, 
and appears in good preservation. 

On the southwest corner of North and Clark Streets stood, 
within a few years, an ancient brick building, reputed to be 
over two hundred years old. It was certainly built as early as 
1650, and probably dated back a few years anterior. It had 
been one of the oldest inns or ordinaries in Boston, and was 
called the " Ship Tavern." It stood at the head of or opposite 
Clark's shipyard, and was kept by John Vyal in 1663. Vyal's 
was a favorite resort of the King's Commissioners, who were 
sent over by Charles II., after the restoration, with instruc- 
tions to visit the New England Colonies, and adjust all 
matters of dispute. Colonel Eichard Nichols, a soldier of 
Turenne, Colonel George Cartwright, Sir Eobert Carr, and 
Samuel Maverick, the founder of East Boston, composed the 
commission. 

Sir Eobert Carr having assaulted a constable at the Ship 
Tavern, Governor Leverett sent a letter requesting Sir Eobert 
to attend at his house to answer the complaint lodged against 
him. Carr replied as follows : — 

gr Yo" I receyved last night in answer to w** as I am S' Eobert 
Carr I would have complyed w"" yo' des}T?es, but as I am w"" y* Kyng's 
Commission, I shal not grant yo' requests, both in respect of his 
Majesty es honor and my oune duty, and rest yours 

Boston Jan. 23. 1666. Egbert Carr 

For Major General John Leverett, these * 

A second summons to Carr was received with a reply more 
insulting in its tenor than the first, and the bellicose commis- 
sioner seems to have avoided the arrest. 

As far back as Yyal's proprietorship the tavern was known 

* Hist, and Antiq. of Boston, 



FROM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTII BATTERY. 175 

as the " Xoah's Ark," doubtless from the fancied resemhlanco 
of the ship on its sign to the Ark of Scripture. By this name 
it was subsequently known until its disappearance in 18G6, both 
in the proprietor's deeds and by common repute. 

The old Ship Tavern, or Xoah's Ark, was probably built by 
Thomas Hawkins, whose shipyard was below. It became later 
the property of Thomas Hutchinson, father of the governor, and 
was given by him to his daughter Hannah, the wife of Eev. 
Samuel ]\Iather. The original building was of two stories, to 
which a third was added by a modern proprietor. The walls 
were of brick, laid in the English Bond, with overhanging eaves, 
and roof with projecting Lutheran Avindows. A seam in the 
old front wall was attributed to the earthquake of 1663. It 
was altogether a remarkable specimen of the antique style of 
buildings, of which not a smgie pure specimen is now existing 
in Boston. 

Besides the tavern, Vyal carried on a brew-house, one of the 
first of which we find any mention, at the corner of Clark and 
Korth Streets, where Mathews' Block now is. This brew- 
house obtained a wide reputation both in the Colonies and 
abroad, rivalling Burton's or Alsopp's of our day. The old 
tavern of Vyal was used as a barrack by the British troops. 
AVhile there, a contagion broke out among them which carried 
olf a large number. 

"What is now Harris Street, next north of Clark, was once 
known as AVhite-Bread Alley, and is so laid down on the maps. 
It was so named from the circumstance that the first penny rolls 
ever offered for sale in Boston were baked there by ]\Iadam 
Tudor. She was an Englishwoman, and began by sending her 
little son, afterwards Deacon John Tudor, around among the 
neighbors with her bread. She died at ninety, and the busi- 
ness was continued by her son. 

"We next come to Salutation Street, raised in modern times 
from the meaner appellation of " alley " without any particular 
pretension to the dignity. Its singular name comes from the 
old Salutation Tavern, in former times at the corner of the 
alley and Xorth Street. A grotesque sign, descriptive of the 



176 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON". 

meeting of two gentlemen of the era of small clothes, cocked 
hats, etc., in the act of greeting each other, gave the hostelry- 
its name. Samuel Green kept there in 1731, and William 
Campbell in 1773. 

The Salutation, also called the Two Palaverers, while kept 
by Campbell, was the rendezvous of the famous ^orth End 
Caucus. In the " Hundred Boston Orators " it is stated that this 
Revolutionary association originated with M^arren, and that tlie 
resolutions for the destruction of the tea were there draAvn up. 
It consisted at first of sixty-one members. Dr. John Young * 
was the first president. When the best means of ridding Bos- 
ton of the regulars was under discussion, Hancock, who was a 
member, exclaimed, " Burn Boston and make John Hancock a 
beggar, if the public good requires it." 

The word " caucus " is said to occur first in Gordon's " History 
of the American Revolution," Vol. I. p. 365, published in 1788. 
He says that more than fifty years previous to his time of writ- 
ing, " Samuel Adams and twenty others in Boston, one or two 
from the ]^orth End of the town, where all the ship business is 
carried on, used to meet, make a caucus, etc." Erom the fact 
that the meetings were held in a part of Boston where all the 
shiji business was carried on, ]Mr. Pickering, in his Vocabulary 
(Boston, 1816), infers that "caucus" may be a corruption of 
" calkers," the word " meeting " being understood. This deriva- 
tion has been adopted by others. 

A few steps bring us to Battery Street, likewise an alley in 
1708, receiving its name from the North Battery below, to 
which it conducted. It formerly run from Charter Street to 
the Battery, but now to Hanover Street only. 

The first mention of what was afterwards called the I*^orth 
Battery occurs in the records in January, 1644, when a work 
at Merry's Point was agreed upon. There was, however, no 
definite action taken until 1646, when there appear propositions 
about a fortification at the North End, " att Walter Merry's 
point." Johnson's " Wonder- Working Providence " speaks of the 
forts on Copp's and Fort Hill as " the one well fortified on the 
superficies thereof with store of great artillery well mounted. 



FEOM BOSTON STONE TO THE NORTH BATTERY. 177 

The other hath a very strong battery built of whole timber and 
filled with earth," the latter being the ^^orth Battery. In 1706 
a i^roject was brought before the town to extend the Xorth 
Battery one hundred and twenty feet, with a breadth of forty 
feet, and £ 1,000 were voted for the improvement and security 
of the work. John Steele had command in 1750. 

The town sold the ^N'ortli Battery to Jeffrey and Russell. It 
became Jeffrey's Wharf between 1789 and 1796, and is now 
Battery Wharf, in memory of its ancient purposes.^ 

The 5 2d, 43d, and 47th British regiments, with companies 
of grenadiers and light infantry, embarked from the North 
Battery on the day of Bunker Hill, as did also the 1st Battalion 
of Marines, led by Major Pitcairn, of Lexington fame, who 
fell a victim to the murderous fire from the fatal redoubt while 
gallantly urging on his men to the attack. 

When Lord Howe evacuated Boston the N'orth Battery was 
armed with seven twelve- pounders, two nine-pounders,. and four 
six-pounders, — all rendered unserviceable. From its position 
the work commanded the entrance to Charles River as well as 
the Town Cove ; and was deemed of the highest military im- 
portance in those days of short-range artillery. 

While in the neighborhood of the prominent wharves, we 
may appropriately refer to the long trucks once used in Boston 
for conveying heavy merchandise. As long ago as 1720 trucks 
were used, when we find, by an order regulating them, none 
were to be " more than eighteen feet long ; to employ but two 
horses in one team ; to carry no more than one ton at a load ; 
and wheel tires to be four inches wide ; the driver to go at the 
head of the thill horse, which he must govern by a halter to be 
kept in the hand," These ponderous vehicles finally disap- 
peared, and Avith them that distinctive body of men, the " Bos- 
ton Truckmen," who once formed a leading and attractive feature 
of our public processions, with their white frocks and black 
hats, mounted on their magnificent truck-horses. Hardy and 
athletic, it would have been hard to find their equals on either 
side of the water. The long jiggers now used are scarcely less 
objectionable than the old trucks. 



178 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



CHAPTEE yi. 

A VISIT TO THE OLD SHIPYARDS. 

Early Ship-Building. — Boston Shipyards. — Massachusetts Frigate. — New 
England Naval Flag. — First Seventy-Four. — Hartt's Naval Yard. — The 
Constitution. — Her Launch, History, and Exploits. — Anecdotes of Hull, 
Bainbridge, and Decatur, — Old Ironsides Rebuilt. — Josiah Barker. — 
Nicholson. — Preble. — Stewart. -^ Other Distinguished Officers. — Escape 
from the British Fleet. — Anecdote of Dr. Bentley. — Action with the 
Guerriere. — The Java. — Cyane and Levant. — Relics of Old Ironsides. — 
Affair of the Figure-Head. — Captain Dewey. — The Frigate Boston. — 
Capture of Le Berceau. — The Argus. 

WE have now brought the reader among the shipyards, 
which were in bygone days a principal feature of the 
North End. The first ship built in the vicinity of Boston was 
the " Blessing of the Bay," at what is now Medford. It was a 
bark of thirty tons ordered by Governor Winthrop, and was 
launched on the 4th of July, 1631. 
Inl632-33a" shippe of a hundred 
tunnes " was launched in the same 
town, so that the Medford ship- 
wrights seem to bear off the palm in 
establishing this industry in our 
neighborhood. The first mention of 
ship-building in Boston occurs in 
1640, and a hundred years later 
ANCIENT SHIP. therc were on the stocks at the same 

time forty topsail vessels with seven thousand tons' capacity. 

As early as 1645 Captain Thomas Hawkins built the Seafort, 
a fine ship of four hundred tons, at his yard at the foot of 
Clark Street ; she was lost on the coast of Spain. John Rich- 
ards succeeded to the yard on the north of the Ship Tavern in 
1688. Clark's yard was the same in 1722. In 1708 Joshua 




A VISIT TO THE OLD SHIPYARDS. 



179 



Gee had a shipyard at the foot of Copp's Hill, and fourteen 
years later there were no less than six yards lying around the 
base of the hill, two below Fort Hill, and another beyond the 
causeway at West Boston. In 1745 was built the Massachu- 
setts Frigate, which, under command of Captain Edward Tyng, 
accompanied Sir William Pepperell's expedition against Louis- 
burg, where she rendered efficient service, capturing the A^igi- 
lant, French man-of-war of sixty-four guns, — more than double 
her own force. According to Captain G. H. Preble's " Notes on 
Early Ship-Building," " when it was designed to reduce Louis- 
burg, Governor Shirley directed Captain Tyng to procure the 
largest ship in his power. He accordingly purchased one on the 
stocks nearly ready for launching, and made such improvements 
upon her that she was able to carry twenty-four to twenty-six 
guns." On her return to Boston this frigate brought Governor 
Shirley and lady, who had been to the theatre of war. They 
met with a splendid ovation at the hands of the Bostonians, as 
we have related elsewhere. 

We may appropriately mention here the colors which were 
used on the sea by the colony before 1700, a 
representation of which is given herewith. 
The field and cross were red, the tree green, 
and the union white. The tree appears as a 
distinctive emblem on the coins as well as the 
flag. 

Pemberton, in his description of Boston, 
written in 1794, says : — 

" Ship-l)uildiTig was formerly carried on at upwards of twenty- 
seven dock-yards in the town at one and the same time, and em- 
ployed a large number of mechanicks. In one of the yards, twelve 
ships have been launched in twelve months. In all the dock-yards, 
I am credibly informed there have been upwards of sixty vessels 
on the stocks at one time, ^lany of the ships built here were sent 
directly to London with naval stores, whale oil, etc., and to the West 
Indies with fish and lumber. The wliale and cod fishery employed 
many of our smaller craft. They were nurseries, and ])ro(hu'ed many 
hardy seamen. Al)out the year 1750, when paper money was sup- 
pressed in this then colony, the sale of ships lying in England, on 




NEW ENGLAND FLAG. 



180 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



account of the o^vne^s here, occasioned a loss to them from twenty 
to forty per cent. Few ships were built here, and ship-building grad- 
ually declined. Vessels are now built in the country towns not far 
fi'om where the timber grows. 

" The harbor of Boston is at this date " (November, 1 794), con- 
tinues Pemberton, "crowded with vessels. Eighty-four sail have 
been counted lying at two of the wharves only. It is reckoned that 
not less than four hundred and fifty sail of ships, brigs, schooners, 
and sloops, and small crafts are now in port." 

The first war-ship built in Boston was a seventy-four, laid 
down at the yard of Benjamin Goodwin, — afterwards Tilley's 
Wliarf, — a short distance from Charlestown Bridge. She was 
ordered by the Continental Congress, and Thomas Cushing, 
afterwards lieutenant-governor, then agent of the government, 
took possession of the dwelling-house, stores, wharf, and yard 
of Goodwin for this purpose. In 1784, the exigency having 
passed by, the ship was sold on the stocks by Thomas Eussell 
as agent of the United States. This was probably the first 
seventy-four begun in the United States. 

It is stated in Emmons's excellent " History of the Navy " that 

the America, built at Portsmouth 
in 1782, the command of which 
was destined for the renowned 
Paul Jones, was the first vessel 
of this class built for our navy. 
She aj^pears to have been the first 
afloat. The America, awarded 
by a unanimous vote of Con- 
gress to the conqueror of the 
Serapis, was given to the French, 
to supply the loss of the Mag- 
nifique, lost in Boston harbor in 
the above year. Her fate is a 
matter of uncertainty. 
Edmund Hartt's shipyard will be forever famous in our an- 
nals as the place where the Pride of the American Navy was 
built. The Hartts were a family of shipwrights. Besides 
Edmund, there were Edward, Zephaniah, and Ralph the mast- 




SHIP OF THE TIME OF THE PILGRIMS. 



A VISIT TO THE OLD SHIPYARDS. 181 

maker. Edmiiiid lived opposite his yard, in what was then Sliip 
ytreet. He was one of the original trustees of the Mechanic 
Charitable Association. 

Before the establishment of government dockyards, private 
yards were used for building national vessels, and Hartt's went 
fpr a long time by tlie name of " Hartt's Xaval Yard." Thorn- 
ton's yard on the map of 1722 corresponds with Hartt's, which 
is now known as Constitution Wharf. 

The frigates Constitution and Boston and brig Argus were 

all built here. All three are known to fame ; but the glorious 

career of Old Ironsides is indelibly associated with the downfall 

of England's naval supremacy. The proud boast of AValler — 

"Otliers may use the ocean as their road, 
Ouly the English make it their abode " — 

was rendered obsolete by the deeds of a navy unborn when he 
wrote. 

In consequence of the depredations of the Algerine corsairs 
upon our commerce, an act was passed at the first session of 
the Third Congress to provide, by purchase or otherwise, four 
ships to carry forty-four guns and two to carry thirty-six. This 
act was approved by President Washington, ]\[arcli 27, 1794. 
The keel of the Constitution was accordingly laid by Mr. Hartt 
in November of that year, and preparations made for setting 
her up. Mr. Cooper, in his Xaval History, says her keel was 
laid on Charlestown Neck, — a situation somewhat remote from 
her actual birthplace, — and has also incorrectly stated the 
date of her launch, an error into which many historians have 
been led by the two unsuccessful attempts made before she 
finally passed to her destined element. 

Peace being concluded with the Dey of Algiers, work was 
ordered stopped on three of the new frigates, and the mate- 
rials sold. The act of July 1, 1797, approved by President 
John Adams, makes tlie first official mention of the Constitu- 
tion. The President was authorized to ciiuse the frigates 
United States, Constitution, and Constellation to be manned 
and employed. 

The names of all who contributed by their labor to the 



182 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

building of Old Ironsides deserve to be perpetuated, but the 
records of the ^^avy Department having been destroyed when 
Washington was captured in 1814, the loss of the mechanics' 
rolls has been supplied only after diligent search. She was 
designed by Joshua Humphries of Philadelphia, and constructed 
under the superintendence of Colonel George Claghorn of New 
Bedford. Captains Barry, Dale, and Truxton of the navy agreed 
with Mr. Humphries upon the dimensions of the Constitution, 
and Mr. Humj)hries prepared the drafts, moulds, and building 
instructions. Her masts and spars were made in the yard be- 
tween Comey's Wharf and the shipyard ; Paul Eevere furnished 
the copper bolts and spikes, drawn from malleable copper by a 
process then new ; and Ephraim Thayer, who had a shop at the 
South End, made the gun-carriages for the frigate. He after- 
wards made those used on the gunboats built under Jefferson's 
administration. Isaac Harris, who worked as an apprentice in 
the mast-yard in 1797, put new sticks into the frigate during 
the war of 1812. To him is said to belong the honor of first 
applying in this country the important improvement of making 
ships' masts in sections. He constructed the first shears used 
at the Navy Yard at Charlestown for placing 
the heavy masts of war-vessels in position. 
A brave act is recorded of him in connection 
with the Old South, and we shaU presently 
allude to him in connection with a very cele- 
brated flag-raising. The anchors of the Con- 
stitution were made in Hanover, Plymouth 
County, Mass, 

Mr. Hartly of Boston, father of a subse- 
quent naval constructor, assisted Colonel Clag- 
uRT-rKArjAKJiFTiN ^^"^ ^ ^^^^^ Captaiu Nicholson, who was ap- 
THE WAR OF 1812. pointcd her first commander, exercised a 
general supervision, in which he was aided by General Jackson 
and Major Gibbs of Boston. Under the orders of Colonel 
Claghorn, Edmund Hartt was the master carpenter. The frig- 
ate's sails were made in the Old Granary, at the corner of Park 
and Tremont Streets, where now stands Park Street Church. 




A VISIT TO THE OLD SHIPYARDS. 183 

No other building in Boston was large enough. The Messrs. 
Skilliiigs of Boston were the carvers of the hgure-head and stern 
ornaments and of the cabin. She first carried at her prow a lig- 
ure of Hercules with uplifted club. This was shot away before 
Tripoli, and seems to have been exchanged at the beginning of 
1812 for a Xeptune, which is alluded to in the old song, — 

" By the Trident of Neiitune, brave Hull cried, let 's steer, 
It points to the track of the bullying Guerriere." 

She subsequently bore a plain billet-head scroll, now preserved 
at Charlestown Xavy Yard by the thoughtful care of some un- 
known commander at that station. Finally, the bows of the 
gallant old craft were decorated with a bust of General Jackson. 
The Constitution first carried an English battery ; her frame 
was live-oak. 

" Day by day the vessel grew, 

Witli timbers fashioned strong and true, 

Stenison and keelson and sternsou knee, 

Till, framed with perfect symmetry, 

A skeleton ship rose up to view." 

At length came the 20th September, 1797, the day on which 
Colonel Claghorn had announced that he would launch the 
Constitution. People poured into the town from all quarters. 
The day was pleasant, but cold, and the neighboring wharves 
were crowded with spectators, who received warning that the 
passage of the vessel into the water would create a swell that 
might endanger their safety. About six hundred people went 
over to Noddle's Island, where they could obtain a fine view of 
the expected launch. At high water, twenty minutes past 
eleven, the signal was given, but the ship only moved about 
eight feet. Her colors were then lowered, and the assembled 
multitude dispersed with disappointment and anxious forebod' 
ings. 

Owing to an accident to the United States, launched at Phil- 
adelphia, by which she ran off the ways an hour before it was 
intended, damaging her keel and injuring several people, the 
ways of the Constitution were laid too level, to prevent a simi- 
lar accident. Part of the site of Hartt's yard was natural, and 
part artificial ; the latter sank under the immense weight. The 



184 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

vessel might have been forced off, but the constructor decided 
not to attempt a measure so hazardous. 

On Friday, the 2 2d, a second effort was made to get the 
frigate afloat. She moved a little and then stuck fast. Grave 
doubts were now expressed as to the practicability of moving 
her, and the " ill-fated ship," as the superstitious now regarded 
her, remained seemingly fixed in her j)osition. 

Saturday, October 21, a third attempt was made, the high 
tides having afforded an opportunity of completing the ways. 
The day was lowering and cold, with an easterly wind. But 
few people assembled, the general belief being that this would, 
like the other attempts, prove abortive. A few dignitaries, 
specially invited, gathered within the narrow limits of the yard. 
At half past twelve p. m. all was ready. 

"And at the mast-head, 
White, blue, and red, 
A flag unrolls the stripes and stars." 

Commodore James Sever stood on the heel of the bowsprit, 
and, according to the usage of the time, baptized the ship with 
a bottle of choice old Madeira from the cellar of Hon. Thomas 
Russell, a leading Boston merchant. A few invited guests, 
among whom were some ladies, stood on the vessel's deck. At 
last, at the given signal, — 

''She starts, — she moves, — she seems to feel 
The thrill of life along her keel ; 
And, spurning with her foot the ground, 
With one exulting, joyous bound, 
She leaps into the ocean's arms ! " 

We have extracted the following incident of the launch from 
the manuscript of Captain Preble's " History of the Flag " : — 

" We are glad to be able to record the name of the person who 
first hoisted our flag over her, little imagining the glorious history 
she would make. When the Constitution was about ready to launch, 
Commodore Nicholson, who had charge and superintendence of her 
construction, left the shipyard to get his breakfast, leaving express 
orders not to hoist any flag over her until his return, intending to 
reserve the honor to himself Among the workmen upon her was a 
shipwright and calker named Samuel Bentley, who, with the assist- 



A VISIT TO THE OLD SHITYAEDS. 185 

ance of another workman named Harris, Lent on and hoisted the 
stars and stripes during the commodore's absence. When the com- 
modore retm-ned and saw our flag, contrary to his orders, fluathig 
over her, he was very 's\Tathy, and expressed himself in words more 
strong than polite to the offending workmen. Could he have fore- 
seen the future of the noble frigate he would have been still more 
excited. He had, however, the satisfaction of being the first to com- 
mand her, and we know she was the first of the new frigates to carry 
the fifteen stars and stripes under canvas upon the deep blue sea. 
Bentley died in Boston in 1852. The fifteen stars and stripes were 
worn by her before Trij)oli and throughout the war of 1812." 

In Emmons's Xaval List the Constitution is described as a 
ship of 44 guns, 400 men, 1,576 tons, and cost, ready for sea, 
$302,719. She has been several times rebuilt, but the orig- 
inal model, tonnage, and general appearance were preserved. 
In 1833 the frigate was taken into the new Dry Dock at 
Charlestown in the presence of the Vice-President Mr. Van 
Buren, Lewis Cass, Secretary of War, the Secretary of the 
Navy ^Ir. Woodbury, and other distinguished personages. The 
President, General Jackson, was to have been present, but was 
prevented by illness. Commodore Hull had charge of her on 
this interesting occasion, and his clear voice was frequently 
heard ringing from the quarter-deck of his former glory. 
Loammi Baldwin, engineer of the Dry Dock, also assisted at 
the ceremony. The frigate was entirely dismantled and dis- 
masted, with all her gingerbread-work stripped off preparatory 
to a thorough overhauling. Her hidl presented a most venera- 
ble appearance, the bottom being covered with mussels, many 
of which were gathered as relics. 

Here she was rebuilt by Josiah Barker, the eminent naval 
constructor of the Vermont and Virginia sliips-of-the-lino, the 
frigate Cumberland, sloops-of-war Marion, Cyane, Bainbridge, 
and many others. Mr. Barker's first shipyard occupied the 
site of the present J^iivy Yard. There is now in this yar4 a 
mast-maker, named Harding, who has more than once masted 
and sparred this good ship. 

The Constitution first moved under canvas July 20, 1798, 
proceeding to sea August 1 3. The roil of her commanders em- 



186 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

braces in their order Samuel Nicholson, who had been a lieu- 
tenant with Paul Jones in his action with the Serapis ; Edward 
Preble, styled " the father of our navy," who had served in the 
old Protector and Winthrop, and who in 1804 gallantly laid 
Old Ironsides under the walls of Tripoli; Isaac Hull, fourth 
lieutenant of the old bark in her first cruise, executive officer in 
1800, and finally in 1812, as commander, the victor in the 
famous action with the Guerriere ; William Bainbridge, a tried 
officer of the old navy, captured in the Philadelphia at Tripoli 
in 1803, and subsequently conqueror in December, 1812, of the 
Java, British frigate ; Charles Stewart, who closed the war so 
gloriously for his flag by the capture of two British frigates, the 
Cyane and Levant. This action was fought on a beautiful 
moonlight evening off Madeira after peace was concluded, but 
by the terms of the treaty the capture was legalized. 

Besides these names, so illustrious in the pages of naval war- 
fare, the Constitution was commanded a short time in 1804 by 
the brave but ill-fated Decatur ; by John Eodgers ; by Jacob 
Jones ; by T. Macdonough, J. D. Elliott, and others, whose 
deeds have passed into history. The brave Lawrence, gallant 
David Porter, Charles Ludlow, and Charles Morris have served 
in her as first-lieutenants, while Isaac Chauncey was a master 
commandant, and Shubrick a lieutenant. The latter officer, 
now rear-admiral and blind, is the only survivor among the 
officers of the battle with the Cyane and Levant, in which he 
was engaged. 

The first crew of the Constitution were, with few exceptions, 
natives of Massachusetts. Her career and exploits are as fa- 
miliar as household words. No ship was ever so loved by a 
nation, not even the famous old Victory of Nelson. Good luck 
pursued her without the intervention of the horse-shoe which 
Nelson carried nailed to his mast-head. 

" Aye, put her atop on the log-book of fame. 

Her voice always roared from the van, 
When she bore down in thunder and darkness and flame, 

Crash foundering each foe tliat before her came, 
The old sailors' love flashes up at her name, 

For her yards Young Americans man." 



A VISIT TO THE OLD SHIPYARDS. 187 

The first cruise of Old Ironsides under Nicholson and the 
second under Talbot are void of any interesting features, and 
it was not until Preble commanded her in the Mediterranean, 
in 1803, that she fired a broadside at an enemy. 

Cooper says that Preble was appointed to the Constitution as 
first lieutenant under Commodore Nicholson, but got relieved, 
his relations with his commander not being cordial. Preble 
hoisted his flag on board the Constitution, May 21, 1803. The 
ship, having been lying in ordinary for ten months, was unfit for 
immediate service, and the commodore caused a thorough over- 
hauling of the vessel to be made, personally scrutinizing every 
rope and timber in her. Under his orders she achieved her 
early reputation, and was, when he turned her over to Decatur, 
a ship to be proud of. After lying some time in President's 
Poads taking in powder, etc., the Constitution weighed anchor 
and sailed on her famous cruise to the Mediterranean, Sunday, 
August 14, 1803. 

Her escape from the British squadron in July, 1812, was due 
to Yankee ingenuity. The method by which this was accom- 
plished is, it is believed, understood by few. The Constitution 
carried two umbrellas, so called, made of stout spars attached to 
a central one precisely like an umbrella frame. These were 
covered with canvas, and were capable of being expanded or 
closed ; the weight of the iron-work caused them to sink. 
While the becalmed British vessels were towing with their 
boats, Hidl caused his umbrellas to be carried out aheail and 
warped his vessel up to them, so contriving, that while one 
was being hauled in the other was being put in position. In 
this way, he left his pursuers astern before they discovered the 
means employed to escape them. These umbrellas are now in 
the Charlestown Navy Yard, where, it is hoped, they may be 
preserved with care. The Constitution ran into ^Marblehead on 
Sunday. 

A\niile Dr. Bentley, pastor of the Second Church at Salem, 
was in the midst of his sermon, some one called out under the 
window of the church, " The British fleet is chasing the Con- 
stitution into Marblehead." The minister instantly dismissed 



188 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

his congregation, seized his hat, and ran out of the church, fol- 
lowing the men and cannon towards the scene of action. Being 
a short, thick-set man, and the mercury at eighty-five, the good 
doctor soon gave out, when he was lifted astride one of the 
cannon, and in this way proceeded to the beach. Dr. Bentley 
was a Boston boy, graduate and tutor at Harvard, and for a 
long time an editor of the Salem Gazette and Salem Eegister. 

The following anecdotes of Hull are printed in Miss Quincy's 
Memoir : — 

" Toward evening on the 29th of August, 1812, a frigate (recog- 
nized as the Constitution) came in under full sail and dropped her 
anchor beside Rainsford Island, — then the cpiarantine ground. The 
next morning a fleet of armed ships appeared off" Point Alderton. 
As they rapidly approached, the Constitution was observed to raise 
her anchor and sails and go boldly forth to meet the apparent 
enemy ; but as the frigate passed the leader of the fleet, a friendly 
recognition was exchanged instead of the expected broadside. They 
joined company, and the Constitution led the way to Boston. It 
was the squadron of Commodore Rodgers returning unexpectedly 
from a long cruise. 

" A few days afterwards, Hull, who had just taken the Guerriere, 
came with Decatur to breakfast at Quincy. When this incident was 
mentioned, Hull said, ' I must acknowledge I participated in the 
apprehensions of my friends on shore. Thinking myself safe in 
port, I told my officers to let the men wash their clothes, and get the 
ship in order to go up to Boston ; and being excessively fatigued, 
went to my stateroom. I was sound asleep when a lieutenant rushed 
down, exclaiming, ' Captain, the British are upon us ! — an armed 
fleet is entering the harbor ! ' No agreeable intelligence, certainly ; 
for I was wholly unprepared to engage with a superior force. But 
determined to sell our lives as dear as I could, I gave orders to clear 
the decks, weigh anchor, and get ready for immediate action. I con- 
fess I was greatly relieved when I saw the American flag and recog- 
nized Rodgers.' In speaking of the conflict with the Guerriere, he 
said, ' I do not mind the day of battle ; the excitement carries one 
through : but the day after is fearful ; it is so dreadful to see my 
men wounded and suff'ering.' 

" These naval officers formed a striking contrast. Hidl was easy 
and prepossessing in his manners, but looked accustomed to face 
* the battle and the breeze.' Decatur was unconmionly handsome, 



A VISIT TO THE OLD SHIPYARDS. 189 

and remarkable for the delicacy and refinement of his appear- 
ance." 

Hull, who had a good deal of the bluff sailor about him, 
exclaimed when he saw the mast of the Guerriere go by the 
board, — " Huzzah, my boys, we 've made a brig of her." A 
shipmaster, prisoner on board the Guerriere, gives an interest- 
ing relation of his experience during the action. While the 
Constitution was manosuvring for position. Captain Dacres asked 
his prisoner, "Do you think she will strike without firing 1 " 

Obtaining permission to retii'e into the cockpit, the captain 
says: — 

"Within one moment after my foot left the ladder the Constitu- 
tion gave that double-shotted broadside which threw all in the cock- 
pit over in a heap on the opposite side of the ship. For a moment 
it seemed as if heaven and earth had struck together ; a more terrific 
shock cannot be imagined." 

After the firing had ceased, the prisoner returned to the deck, 
and continues : — 

" What a scene was presented, and how changed in so short a time, 
during which the Guerriere had been totally dismasted and otherwise 
cut to pieces, so as not to make her worth towing into port. On the 
other hand, the Constitution looked perfectly fresh, and even those 
on board the Guerriere did not know what ship had fought them. 
Captain Dacres stood with his officers surveying the scene, — all in 
the most perfect astonishment." 

" At this moment a boat was seen putting off from the hostile ship. 
As soon as within speaking distance, a young gentleman (]\Iidship- 
man, late Commodore Reed) hailed and said, ' Commodore Hull's 
com])liments, and wishes to know if you have struck your flag?' 
At this Captain Dacres appeared amazed, but recovering himself and 
looking u}) and do^vn, he deliberately said, — ' Well, I don't know ; 
— our mainmast is gone, our mizzenmast is gone, and upon the whole 
you may say we have struck our flag.' " 

The little hurt received by the Constitution in this engage- 
ment — her bull showing only here and there a scar — gave her 
the name of Old Ironsides, by which she was familiarly known. 
Her crew, indeed, affirmed that the Guerriere's shot fell harm- 
less from her " iron sides." 



190 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Old Ironsides arrived in Boston on a Sunday, about noon, 
from this cruise. The ship was soon surrounded by boats 
eager to learn the news, which was communicated to the first 
that came alongside. Instantly the word was passed to the 
other boats, " The Constitution has captured the Guerriere ! " 
The men cheered, swung their hats, and spread the joyful 
tidings to the shore, where thousands gathered on the wharves 
took up the refrain until it echoed from one extremity of the 
town to the other. 

"On Brazil's coast she ruled the roast 
When Bainbridge was her captain ; 
Neat hammocks gave, made of the wave, 
Dead Britons to be wrapped in." 

Bainbridge, who succeeded Hull in the command of the Con- 
stitution, next fought a well-contested action with the Java on 
the coast of Brazil, December 29, bringing his own ship victo- 
riously out of the fight. The Java, indeed, only struck her 
flag after the loss of every mast and spar, bowsprit included. 
Her gallant commander, Lambert, was mortally wounded. The 
disabled condition of his prize, with the great distance from our 
own shores, compelled Bainbridge to destroy the Java, as Hull 
had destroyed the Guerriere. When the officers of the Java 
left the Constitution at St. Salvador, they expressed the warm- 
est gratitude for the humane and generous treatment they had 
experienced. 

Bainbridge returned to Boston from this cruise, arriving on 
the 15th of February. He was received on landing by a salute 
of artillery, and a procession was formed at Faneuil Hall headed 
by the " Boston Light Infantry " and " Winslow Blues," which 
escorted the commodore to the Exchange Coffee House, where 
the company sat down to a superb banquet. Hull and Rodgers 
walked with Bainbridge in the procession, and shared the ap- 
plause bestowed upon him. At the dinner Governor Gore pre- 
sided, assisted by H. G. Otis, Israel Thorndike, T. L. Winthrop, 
William Sullivan, and others. The Legislature being in session 
passed complimentary resolutions. 

The commodore, with some of his officers, visited the Federal 



A VISIT TO THE OLD SHIPYARDS. 191 

Street Theatre, where they were immediately recognized by the 
audience, which rose up as if by one impulse, while cheer upon 
cheer shook the house from pit to dome. The veteran Cooper, 
Avho on that night was playing Macbeth, flung his bonnet in 
the air and joined in the applause. 

In June, 1813, Stewart was appointed to command her, and 
proceeded to sea December 30, although Boston was then block- 
aded by seven of the enemy's ships. She returned in April, 
1814, and was chased into Marblehead by the frigates Tene- 
dos and Junon. The country was alarmed, and the local 
militia from Xewburyport to Boston marched to defend the 
frigate ; one Boston company, the New England Guards, pro- 
ceeded as far as Charlestown, when they learned that the pursuit 
had been abandoned. They then found that their cartridge- 
boxes were empty. 

In December, 1814, Stewart sailed on his second cruise and 
encountered, February 28, off Madeira, the British frigates 
Cyane and Levant, which were both captured after a contest 
in which the Constitution was handled with consummate skill 
by her commander. Of the prizes, only the Cyane succeeded 
in reaching the United States, the Levant being recaptured by 
Sir George Collier's squadron, which suddenly appeared off Port 
Praya, where Old Ironsides was quietly lying with her captives. 
All three vessels were compelled to cut their cables and run for 
it. The Cyane arriving first at New York, great anxiety was 
felt for the Constitution, and on her arrival at that port on the 
15th of May, 1815, the ship and commander were greeted with 
the utmost enthusiasm. 

On the 4th of July, 1828, Old Ironsides returned from a long 
cruise in the Mediterranean to the place of her nativity. As 
she passed up to the Navy Yard, the roar of her guns mingled 
with the echoes from the Castle and from Constitution AVharf, 
the place of her birth. The guns were firing peaceful salutes 
instead of round shot and grape, but the presence of the idolized 
frigate gave additional eclat to the national holiday. 

It was at one time decided to break her up, and orders had 
actually been issued to this effect. The destruction of her old 



192 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



timbers seemed like an act of sacrilege, and gave rise to Holmes's 
much admired lines expressive of tlie universal feeling of con- 
demnation. To the poet's impassioned outburst is due the 
preservation of the Constitution on the roll of the American 

Navy : — 

"0, better that lier shattered hull 

Should sink beneath the wave ; 
Her thunders shook the mighty deep. 

And there should be her grave. 
Nail to the mast her holy flag, 

Set every threadbare sail, 
And give her to the god of storms, 

The lightning, and the gale." 

From the old timbers were made a number of relics which 
have no doubt been highly prized by their possessors. Mr. 
Barker, the constructor, sent a cane to Joshua Humphries, her 
original designer. In 1836 a beautiful coach was built entirely 
of the wood of the old frigate at Amherst, Mass., intended as 




THE CONSTITUTION HAULED UP ON THE WAYS. 

a New- Year's present to General Jackson from several gentlemen 
of New York City. Commodore Hull presented canes from the 
original wood to President Jackson, Mr. Van Buren, and Mr. 
Poinsett at the time the ship was docked. 



A VISIT TO THE OLD SHIPYARDS. 193 

The captured flags of the Cyane, Levant, Guerriere, and Java 
are in the Xaval Academy at AnnapoHs, but of her original 
battery, before which the " wooden walls of Old England " went 
down, no traces have l)een found. One of the guns was dented 
by the enemy's shot ; but we have reason to apprehend that these 
dogs of war were broken up and treated as so much old iron. 

The Constitution carried out Ministers Barlow and Cass to 
France, and brought home Mr. Livingstone and family. Her 
flag has been seen in nearly every sea, and her deck has been 
trod by many noble personages. In 1822, while in the Medi- 
terranean, she was visited by Lord Byron, who, while endeavor- 
ing to preserve his incognito, was much embarrassed at finding 
all the officers on deck in full uniform to receive him. Lord 
B}Ton was accompanied by Count Gamba, father of the Count- 
ess Guiccioli. A beautifully bound volume of his poems was 
lying on the cabin table, which he took up with evident pleasure 
at the delicate compliment implied. 

An episode of this visit caused Byron to remark, " that he 
would rather have a nod from an American than a snuff'-liox 
from an emperor." This is in pleasing contrast with the surly 
saying of Johnson, — "I am willing to love all mankind except 
an American." At this time Commodore Jacob Jones flew his 
broad pennant on board the old craft. 

After Old Ironsides had emerged a new ship from ]Mr. Bar- 
ker's hands, there happened to her an adventure that awakened 
at the time the most intense excitement in Boston, and which, 
from its peculiar aspects, was soon communicated all over 
the seaboard. This was known as the " Aff'air of the Figure- 
Head." Andrew Jackson was President, and had been greeted 
with the consideration due his official station during his visit to 
Boston of the previous year. Under this outward courtesy, 
however, was an undercurrent of political antagonism, apparent 
enough in the pul)lic i)rints of the day. Cheers were raised for 
Mr. Clay in Faneuil Hall at the time of General Jackson's re- 
ception there. The old political party which controlled Boston 
was putting on the new title of " Whig," under which it subse- 
quently fought. Not even the LL. D. conferred upon the Pres- 
9 M 



194 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

ident at Harvard could reconcile the opposition with the acts 
of his administration. 

The appearance of the frigate Constitution, therefore, with a 
figure-head of President Jackson was greeted with a storm of 
disapproval. When it was known that it was the intention of 
Commodore Jesse D. Elliott, the then commander of the Xavy 
Yard, to thus ornament the frigate's bows, and that Laban S. 
Beecher, the well-known Boston carver, was at work upon it, 
threats were freely made that she would not be allowed to go 
to sea with the obnoxious image. Large bribes were also offered 
to the artist to destroy his work, but he remained true to his 
employers, working on the figure-head in his garret, which 
served alike as his atelier and citadel. Alarmed, however, by 
the menaces against Beecher, and thinking the head no longer 
safe in his custody, Commodore Elliott caused its removal by 
an armed boat's crew to the Navy Yard, where it was placed in 
the engine-house and finished by Beecher at liis leisure. The 
figure represented the President in the Hermitage scene, holding 
in his hand a scroll with the motto, " The Union it must be 
preserved." Beecher was also engaged upon the busts of Hull, 
Bainbridge, and Stewart for stern ornaments of the frigate. 

The graven image was placed at the Constitution's stem, but 
on the 3d of July (1834) was discovered to have been muti- 
lated, — the head being sawed comj^letely off, leaving only the 
body of the Chief Magistrate. The affair caused a great noise. 
It was committed during the prevalence of a violent thunder- 
storm, with sentinels pacing the ship's deck, while she herself 
lay moored between two seventy-fours (the Independence and 
Columbus) off the yard. The act was a daring one, and con- 
jecture was for a long time busy as to its author, who, however, 
maintained a prudent reserve until the excitement caused by 
the affair had time to cool. "VNHiat this excitement was may be 
understood when it is stated that the people of Wheeling, Ya., 
rang the bells, assembled in public meeting, and passed resolu- 
tions approving the act. 

'On the night in question. Captain Dewey, a Boston ship- 
master, obtained a small row-boat, and dropped quietly down 



A VISIT TO THE OLD SHIPYARDS. 195 

with the tide to where the frigate lay moored. Securing his 
boat he proceeded to his work, in the accompUshment of which 
he had to cut tlirough a copper bolt. Several times the sentry 
on deck looked over the bow, — hearing perhaps the noise of 
the saw, — when the workman ceased liis labor for the time. 
The rain poured in torrents, which, with the intense darkness, 
favored the bold operator. The head of Jackson, like a victim 
of the seraglio, fell into a sack. Dewey pidled to the shore 
and repaired to meet some friends at a public-house, where his 
success was duly celebrated. 

In this phght the Constitution — she was then in commis- 
sion — proceeded to Xew York, where, in due time, a second 
figure-head bearing the same features took the place of the 
headless one. To secure it from a similar mutilation, a copper 
bolt of extraordinary thickness was placed perpendicularly in 
the head. At the Charlestown Navy Yard may be seen the 
bust of General Jackson from which the original was mod- 
elled. 

In March, 1835, the Constitution sailed from New York for 
the ^lediterranean as flag-ship of Commodore Elliott, since 
M'liich time her history is that of a usefid but peaceful sliip. 
At the outbreak of the EebeUion she was lying at Annapolis, 
Avhere she would doubtless have shared the fate of the govern- 
ment vessels at Norfolk and elsewhere, had not our soldiers 
opportunely secured the place. Edward E. Preble, a grandson 
of the commodore, was on board the Constitution at this time. 
After being used as quarters for the midshipmen of the Naval 
Academy at Newport and Annapolis, she was, in 1871, towed 
round to Philadelphia and laid up. She will bear a consiiicuous 
part in the centennial celebration of 1876. 

From sources already mentioned it is ascertained that she 
captured eight armed vessels carrying one hundred and fifty- 
eight guns, and ten unarmed prizes. From this statement it 
will be seen that her crews shared more hard knocks than prize 
money. 

The next war-vessid built at Hartt's yard was the Boston 
frigate of seven hundred tons, so called because she was built 



196 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

by the subscription of Boston merchants and others, and given 
a free-will offering to the government. She was designed, 
probably, by Mr. Hartt, and built under his superintendence. 
Her rate was to have been a thirty-six, but she mounted only 
tAventy-eight guns. On the 2 2d of August, 1798, her keel was 
laid, and in April, 1799, President Adams appointed Captain 
George Little, of Massachusetts, to command her. June 12 
she hauled into the stream, and sailed on her first cruise July 
24, 1799. She was declared to be one of the handsomest ves- 
sels that ever floated. 

The names of those persons who contributed to build the 
Boston are worthy of preservation. A notice appeared in the 
Centinel of June 27, 1798, that a subscription would be opened 
in the chamber over Taylor's Insurance Office (corner of State 
and Kilby Streets) at one o'clock, " where those who wish to 
join in this testimonial of public spirit " might affix their sig- 
natures. At this meeting $ 115,250 was raised, of which Hon. 
William Phillips gave $ 10,000. This subscrijjtion was subse- 
quently increased to $130,000; the frigate cost $137,969. 
David Sears, Stephen Higginson, Eben Parsons, John Codman, 
Joseph Coolidge and Son, Theodore Lyman, Boot and Pratt, 
and Thomas Dickinson gave $ 3,000 each. Samuel Parkman 
and Samuel Elliott gave $ 4,000 each. Benjamin Joy, James 
and T. H. Perkins, Thomas Walley, John Parker, Stephen Hig- 
ginson, Jr., Abiel Smith, and Thomas C. Amory are down for 
$ 1,500 each. St. Andrew's Lodge gave $ 1,000. Benjamin 
and Kathaniel Goddard and Josiah Quincy gave $ 500. The 
givers of smaller sums are not less deserving of mention, but 
are too numerous for our limits. 

The Boston got to sea during the hostilities with France, and 
soon distinguished herself on the AVest India station by cap- 
turing Le Berceau, a ship of twenty-four guns and two hundred 
and twenty men ; Les Deux Anges, ship of twenty guns ; three 
barges, and three unarmed prizes. At this time she was one of 
Commodore Talbot's squadron. The next year, under command 
of Captain McNeil, the Boston carried a minister to France 
and joined the Mediterranean fleet. 



A VISIT TO THE OLD SHIPYARDS. 197 

Captain Little brouglit Le Berceau, liis prize, into Boston 
early in Xovember. The Frenclmian was completely dismasted 
in the engagement, but was repaired and restored to the French 
under treaty stipulations. For circimistances attending this 
capture, Captain Little was court-martialled, the court sitting 
on board the Constitution, but was honorably acquitted. In 
her action with Le Berceau the Boston had four killed and 
eight wounded. The French prisoners were confined at the 
Castle. 

In 1812 the Boston was reported unworthy of rejjair, and in 
1814, when the British were advancing on Washington, she was 
burned to prevent her falling into the enemy's hands. 

The brig Argus, sixteen guns, two hundred and twenty-six 
tons, Avas built at Hartt's yard in 1803, at a cost of $37,420. 
She was designed by Mr. Hartly. In August, 1813, having 
landed Mr. Crawford, our Minister to France, at Havre, she 
proceeded to cruise oft' the English and Irish coasts, and cap- 
tured and burnt so many vessels that the Irish declared the 
Channel was all ablaze. Between the Shannon and the Lifley 
she captui-ed twenty vessels, most of which were burnt. On the 
14th August, 1813, the Argus fought and was captured by the 
British brig Pelican, of twenty-one guns. Lieutenant Wm. H. 
Allen of the Argus was mortally wounded early in the conflict ; 
he was Decatur's first lieutenant when he took the ^lacedonian. 
The Argus had also been a busy cruiser during the war with 
Tripoli. Both HuU and Decatur had commanded her. 



198 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 



CHAPTEE VII. 

COPP'S HILL AND THE VICINITY. 

Copp's Hill. —British Works. — Ancient Arch. — Wra. Gray. — Old Ferry. 

— Reminiscences of Bunker Hill. — The Cemetery. — Curious Stones, 
Epitaphs, etc. — Old Fimeral Customs. — Charter Street. — Sir Wm. 
Phips. — John Foster Williams. — John Hull. — Colonial Mint. — Christ 
Church. — Revere's Night Ride. — The Chimes. — The Vaults, — Legends 
of. — Major Pitcairn. — Love Lane. — North Latin Scliool. — Prmce Street. 

— Salem Church. — North End Heroes. — Captain Manly. — Massachu- 
setts Spy. — First Baptist Church. — Second Baptist Church. — Draft Riot, 
1863. 

WE pursue our way, after our long halt among the ship- 
yards, around the base of Copp's Hill. The hill itself 
is the early Mill Field of 1632 and later, so called because the 
windmill used to grind the settlers' corn was brought from Cam- 
bridge in this year and ]3laced upon the summit. This was the 
first windmill erected in the town. The appearance of Copp's 
Hill, which name is from William Coj^p, an early possessor, is 
very different to-day from what it was in 1800. At that time 
the hill terminated abruptly on the northwest side in a rugged 
cliff almost inaccessible from the water-side. Southerly, the 
ground fell away in an easy descent to the bottom of North 
Square and the shore of the Mill Pond, while to the eastward 
a gradual slope conducted to the North Battery. The beach at 
the foot of the headland, opposite Charlestown, was made into 
a street Avith earth taken from the summit of the hill, which 
was where Snow-Hill Street now crosses it. This made Lynn 
Street, — our Commercial Street extension, — and afforded a 
continuous route along the water. 

Going north, the rising ground at Richmond Street indicates 
the beginning of the ascent. The hill has been known as Wind- 
mill Hill and as Snow Hill ; but our ancestors were never at a 




COPP'S HILL AND THE VICINITY. 199 

loss for names, as ai)pears in the redinulancy of tlieir street 
nomenclature. The foot of the hill, at the northeasterly side, 
went in (,)l(l times by the name of Xew Guinea, on account 
of its being exclusively inliabiteil by 
blacks. A re^jresentation is here given 
of the kind of wdnchnill used by the 
first settlers of Boston. Its architecture 
differs entirely from the mills used by 
the French in Canada, the old stone 
mill at XeAvport, or of the western set- 
tlements of the French. It is a copy 
of one set up at West Boston, the de- 
sign for wliich may have been brought 
from the Low Countries. 

The work erected by the British from ^"'^^'^ '"^^• 

which they bombarded the Americans on Bunker Hill and 
set fire to Charlestown, was on the summit of the eminence, 
near the southwest corner of the Burial Groimd. It was a 
small affair, consisting, when it was visited in the following year 
(1776), of only a few barrels of earth to form parapets. Three 
twenty-eight pounders, mounted on carriages, were left spiked 
within. The battery was covered by a small earthwork to the 
rear designed for the infantry. Traces of these works remained 
until the summit was levelled in 1807. 

At the foot of Henchman's Lane, when the work of excava- 
tion was proceeding at this point, there was uncovered an arch 
built of bricl^, of large dimensions, with an opening at the water 
side. There w^as originally a high bank at this place, — the 
arch spanning the then Lynn Street and communicating with 
the cellar of a house on the north side. About forty years ago, 
when digging for the foundation of the houses on the east side 
of the street, the remains of the arch were found, and are still 
to be seen in the cellar of the house opposite Henchman's Lane. 

Those who examined it while it was intact are of the opinion 
that it was intended as a place of concealment for smugglers and 
their contraband goods. Many speculations were indulged as 
to its origin and its uses, the theory that it was a retreat for 



200 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

jDirates being the favorite one. Time has disclosed that it was 
built by a Captain Gruchy during the French wars, and used as 
a place of deposit for captured goods. Perhaps the captain was 
a free-trader, or htted out privateers to prey upon the commerce 
of the French king. Gruchy was a subsequent owner of Sir 
William Phips's house, his land running down the hill to the 
water's edge. He built him a wharf of two captured vessels, 
which he sunk for the purpose."^ These old arches were a 
unique feature of Old Boston, and doubtless began to be built 
about the time Pandolph made the attempt to collect the king's 
excise. Another is noted built by Edward Hutchinson from 
his house on North Street. 

Lynn Street is described in 1708 as from the Xorth Battery 
northwesterly to the F'erry-way at Hudson's Point ; it retained 
this name until after 1828. Before it was built into a thor- 
oughfare this street was only a narrow way around the beach. 
Henchman's Lane is coeval with Lynn Street in receiving its 
name, which was from Captain Daniel Henchman, father of the 
bookseller, who lived within its precincts. 

We next come to Foster Street, in the lower part of which 
was formerly the cannon and bell foundry of Paul Eevere. Up 
to the time of the establishment of these works both cannon 
and bells were imported ; but Revere cast brass guns success- 
fully, and some of his bells still hang in our steeples. Hollow- 
ware, stoves, and a variety of articles for domestic use were 
manufactured at this foundry, erected previous to ITO-l. 

The rain had been falling as we continued our walk through 
the filthy street along the water. The air was filled with the 
stench arising under the warm sun from the mud and garbage 
of the gutter, and from every door and window of the over- 
crowded tenements peered forth a swarm of dirty humanity. 
Some one has called the Irish the finest peasantry in the world, 
but perhaps he had not seen them herded together in our cities. 
Musing on these disenchanting features of our antiquarian pur- 
suit, we cast our eyes upward in the direction of Christ Church 
steeple, which serves us as a guide and beacon, — 

* Mrs. Crocker's Memoir. 



COPP'S HILL AND THE VICINITY. 201 

" Anil lo ! from out a dirty alley, 
Where pigs and Irish wont to rally, 
I saw a crazy woman sally, 
Bedaubed with grease and mud," 

The reader knows Avliat a trifle will suffice to collect a crowd 
in the city. Let a single individual stop in one of our crowded 
thoroughfores and gaze intently in any direction, he will be 
instantly surrounded by a curious, gaping multitude. AVe 
quickened our pace, and left behind us the throng gathering 
around the poor creature crazed with drink, blaspheming, and 
tearing her hair by handfuls. In this manoeuvre we were antici- 
pated by a prudent policeman who turned the corner in our front. 

About half-way from the ferry to Charlestown Bridge is Gray's 
"N^Tiarf, built by Hon. William Gray, better known by the so- 
briquet of "Billy." Beginning at the lowest round of the 
ladder, he climbed to the highest mercantile eminence, and at 
the time of his death, in 1825, was the largest ship owner in 
America, perhaps in the world. He was the owner at one time 
of sixty square-rigged vessels, whose sails whitened every sea. 
Mr. Gray, after acting in the State Legislature, was elected lieu- 
tenant-governor with Elbridge Gerry in 1810. He was a Dem- 
ocrat in politics, sustaining the embargo, notwithstanding it 
inflicted a heavy loss upon him. He lived in Summer Street, 
in the mansion previously occupied by Governor Sullivan. 

There were few to whom the iace of the old merchant was 
not familiar. He was an early riser, and performed a consid- 
erable amount of work before breakflist. Afl'able in intercourse, 
unostentatious in manner, INIr. Gray was also a man of ju-actical 
benevolence. He aided the government largely in 1812, and 
it is said but for him the Constitution would not have got to 
sea and electrified the nation by her exploits. INIr. Gray was 
the first president of the State Bank, the first democratic bank- 
ing institution that obtained a charter in Massachusetts. After 
the Treaty of Ghent, ^Ir. Gray presided over a public dinner 
given to John Quincy Adams, at which the venerable patriarch, 
John Adams, was also present, ^Ir, Gray's old homestead in 
Salem afterwards became the Essex Coli'ee House. 

Benjamin Goodwin, mentioned in the preceding chapter in 
9* 



202 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 

connection with the seventy-four, hved in a house between 
Charter and Lynn Streets extending from one street to the 
other. Goodwin's Wharf extended from a point opposite his 
house, and was sixty to eighty rods east of the bridge. He 
carried on a distillery, bake-house, and blacksmith-shop. The 
premises were seized by order of the British general, and occu- 
pied by his troops at the time of the battle of Bunker Hill. 
The soldiers afterwards wantonly destroyed much of the prop- 
erty and some of the buildings, Mr. Goodwin's damages being 
estimated at £ 1,500, lawful money. 

Hudson's Point, the extreme northwest point of the town, 
was named from Francis Hudson, the ferry-man. It is first 
called " y® Mylne Point," in the grant of the ferry to Thomas 
Marshall in 1635. At this point were established both the 
ferries to Charlestown and Chelsea. To be exact, the Ferry- 
way was, in 1720, between Mr. Gee's and Hudson's Point, and 
Mr. Joshua Gee, the boat-builder, owned the present property 
of the Gas Company, his residence being in Prince Street, a 
short distance from his yard. This Mr. Gee was also owner of 
a large tract on Copp's Hill, between Charter, Prince, and Snow- 
Hill Streets. The town voted in 1720 to move the General 
Court to take action about a bridge at this place, but no action 
followed. 

Among the reminiscences of the old Ferry, besides being the 
probable landing of Winthrop's company and the place where 
the lirst white woman jumped ashore, it is noted as the point 
of debarkation for the British wounded from Bunker Hill. 
Their admitted loss in this battle was two hundred and twenty- 
six killed, eight hundred and twenty-eight wounded, though 
estimates have been made as high as fifteen hundred. In 
Frothingham's account of the battle is the following description 
of the harrowing scene : — 

" The wounded during the whole night and the next day were 
conveyed to Boston, where the streets were filled with gi-oans and 
lamentation. A letter of June 30, 1775, says : ' I have seen many 
from Boston who were eyewitnesses of the most melancholy scene 
they ever beheld m this part of the world. The Saturday night and 



COPP'S HILL AND THE VICINITY. 203 

Sabbath were taken up in canying over the dead and wounded ; and 
all the wood-carts in town, it is said, were employed, — chaises and 
coaches for the officers. They have taken the workhouse, ahnshouse, 
and manufactory house for the wounded.' The physicians, surgeons, 
and apothecaries of Boston rendered every assistance in their power. 
The processions were melancholy sights. * In the first carriage,' 
\mtes Clarke, 'was Major Williams, bleedmg and dying, and three 
dead captains of the 52d. In the second, four dead officers ; then 
another with wounded officers.' The privates who died on the field 
were immediately buried there, — ' in holes,' Gage's report states. 
' On Monday morning,' a British account says, ' all the dead officers 
were decently buried in Boston in a private manner, in the different 
churches and chui'chyuxds there.'" 

Francis Eawdon, afterwards Marquis of Hastings, and George 
Harris, after^vards a peer, were both officers of tlie 5tli, and 
wounded. The 5tli, 59th, and the AYelsli Fusileers were ter- 
ribly cut up. 

The first act of the British commander before the Lexington 
expedition, wliich had a hostile look, was the hauling of the 
Somerset man-of-war from the stream where she had been lying 
into Charles Eiver, so as to command the Ferry-ways. This is 
stated in the Salem Gazette of April 18, 1775, and was to pre- 
vent communication of the intended movement to the country. 
This vessel served to cover the disorderly retreat of the regulars 
over Charlestown Neck on their return from Lexington and 
Concord. We shaU see that the Somerset's watch was iU-kept, 
and tluit a North End mechanic looked into the muzzles of her 
guns as he carried Warren's errand and spread the tidings 
abroad. The Somerset went ashore on Cape Cod during the 
war, and her officers and crew were made prisoners by the 
militia, and sent to Boston. 

When Burgoyne's army was near Cambridge as prisoners of 
war, some of the officers pushed on over the ferry into Boston ; 
but their hopes of comfortable quarters and good cheer were 
speedily dashed, for they were all peremptorily ordered back to 
the prisoners' camps at Union, Wint(T, and Prospect Hills, 
where barracks had been pre])ared for them. Burgoyne him- 
self, had the privilege of entree into tlie town, which he im- 



204 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 




THE MATHER TOMB. 



proved as we have seen, though times were changed since he 
stood on Copp's Hill and saw his comrades-in-arms advance up 
the hillside across the river to storm the American redoubt. 
Burgoyne's graphic account of the battle written to Lord Stan- 
ley has supplied the best English narration of the battle of 
Bunker Hill. A rapier once belonging to the general is in 
possession of a descendant of that Benjamin Goodwin whose 
property was so ill-used by the king's troops. 

Copp's Hill Burying-Ground, first called the ISTorth Burying- 

Place, was the second jolace of 
sepulture within the town. 
About tliree acres is enclosed 
by the cemetery walls, made 
up of several tracts. The 
first was conveyed to the town 
in 1659, and composed the 
northeastern part. An addi- 
tional parcel was conveyed in 
1711 by Samuel Sewall and his wife Hannah, the daughter of 
John Hidl, for the purpose of enlargement. In the convey- 
ance was reserved "one rodd square in which Mrs. Mary 
Thatcher now lyeth buried," which they had previously con- 
veyed to Joshua Gee. The deed also gave the right of way 
across the burying-ground, so that a small piece of private 
property, without any restrictions as to its use, exists in the 
midst of the cemetery. Another strip of land was added 
on the Hull Street side in after years. On the Snow-HiU 
Street side the hiU has been cut down twenty feet, the cem- 
etery being there protected by a heavy granite wall. A gun- 
house once stood in the southeast corner of the new part of 
the cemetery. 

When we are at King's Chapel, or the Granary Burial- 
Ground, amid the bustle of a crowded thoroughfare, the mind 
is wholly divested of those feelings of calm and solitude with 
which we are accustomed to view the last resting-places of the 
dead. The superstitious do not hurry past, nor do the timid 
pass by on the other side. The absence of funeral rites for so 



COPP'S HILL AND THE VICINITY. 205 

long a time deprives them of the awe and reverence which such 
mournful pageants inspire ; the living move on in a continual 
tide, unbroken except in the still watches of the night, sepa- 
rated only by a narrow barrier from the motionless dead. 

But iji Copp's Hill it is ditferent. Quiet prevails, and we 
ahnost expect to hear the clink of Old Mortality's chisel among 
the gTavestones. 

" Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade, 
Wliere heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap, 
Each in his narrow cell forever laid, 
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep." 

Copp's Hill is, however, strangely like the Chapel Ground in 
one respect. The same mathematical precision is observable in 
the laying out of the walks and arrangement of the stones. 
AVhile a cemetery may be beautified under a competent hand, 
what can excuse the wholesale depredations made among the 
bones of our ancestors of the uSTorth End ? 

Apparently the oldest stone in this cemetery bears the date 
of 1625, or before the settlement of Boston, being that of 
Grace Berry ; that of Joanna, daughter of William Copp, is 
dated 1625-6. It is said that these stones were altered in a 
boyish freak, by George Darracott, and thus made to folsify his- 
tory. It is Avorthy of remark that in Bridgman's epitaplis of 
Copp's Hill, these inscriptions are given as altered, without ex- 
planation. The true dates are 1695-6. 

Since the beautiful symbolic customs of the Greeks and Ro- 
mans, their emblems are to be found in every churchyard. The 
broken column, the cylinder and sphere, the monumental urn 
and torch, are types derived from antiquity. The pyramids 
of Egypt, the tombs by the banks of the Nile, now used by the 
living, and the splendid mausoleums of the Greeks and Bomans, 
are evidences of the respect and veneration felt for the departed 
in centuries gone by. Inscriptions were early used by the 
Greeks until forbidden by Lycurgus, except to such as died in 
battle. Since then wit, humor, and sentiment have been ex- 
hausted on marble or stone. Too many, perhaps, profess a 
virtue if they have it not ; others are facetious, marking the 



206 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

passage of a soul into eternity with a flippant jest. Pope and 
Byron wrote epitaphs on dogs, and Voltaire on a bird, while 
Prior demolishes the pretensions of Westminster Abbey in four 

lines : — 

" Nobles and heralds, hy your leave, 

Here lies what once was Matthew Prior, 
The son of Adam and of Eve ; 

Can Stuart or Nassau claim higher ? " 

The following is from a stone in Copp's Hill : — 

"A sister of Sarah Lucas lieth here. 
Whom I did love most dear, 
And now her soul liath took its flight. 
And bid her spightful foes good night." 

Many of the inscriptions are in rude contrast with the beau- 
tifully chiselled armorial bearings here seen, as in King's Chapel 
Ground, the best executed specimens of mortuary sculpture being 
usually imported from England. Some of the stones are indeed 
primitive, being little more than solid blocks, — massy, and 
scarce shaped into form. Quaint inscriptions, the traditional 
death's-head and hourglass, greet you on every hand. Many of 
the older inscriptions are illegible, — what wonder, after more 
than two hundred years' conflict with the elements ! Is the 
spirit which prompted the pious work of Old Mortality extin- 
guished in our historical institutions 1 

The singular juxtaposition of names strikes the reader of the 
headstones in Copp's Hill. Here repose the ashes of Mr. John 
Milk and Mr. William Beer ; of Samuel Mower and Theodocia 
Hay ; Timothy Gay and Daniel Graves ; of Elizabeth Tout and 
Thomas Scoot. Here lie Charity Brown, Elizabeth Scarlet, and 
Marcy White ; Ann Ruby and Emily Stone. The old familiar 
North End names are here on every side. The Huguenot 
Sigourneys ; the Grays, of rope-making fame ; the Mountforts, 
claiming descent from the Norman Conquest. Edmund Hartt, 
builder of the Constitution ; Deacon Moses Grant and Major 
Seward of Eevolutionary memory, and a host of others who go 
to swell the ranks of the unnumbered dead. 

On the Charter Street side, near the northeast corner of the 
ground, is a beautiful weeping willow, its foliage drooping grace- 



corr's HILL and the vicinity. 207 

fidly oA'cr the mouument of Joshua Ellis. This willow came 
from the gxave of the great Corsicaia at St. Helena, having been 
brought in a vessel from the island. 

Interments are now restricted to the tombs, and if we ex- 
cept the occasional pilgrimage of a stranger, the cemetery seems 
to be the common playground of the children of the neighbor- 
hood. Brick rises on all sides to exclude the glorious view 
which once expanded before the spectator ; only glimpses are 
obtained of the distant sjjires and monument of Charlestown, 
with perhaps a hand's-breadth here and there of the river and 
shipping below. 

Acts of vandalism are recorded with respect to some of the 
gravestones in the yard. Those of Grace Berry and Captain 
Daniel i\Ialcolm having served King George's soldiers for target- 
practice, by wliich they were splintered, and the inscriptions 
defaced. The names on some of the old tombs have been 
obliterated and others substituted. The beautiful coat of arms 
of the Hutchinsons has been thus desecrated. So says Thomas 
Bridgman in his Epitaphs. The remains of Thomas Hutch- 
inson, father of the governor, once rested here. Besides the 
Mathers, Andrew and John Eliot, divines of old celebrity, lie 
here. 

From Copp's Hill Burgoyne and Clinton witnessed the fight 
on Bunker Hill, and directed the lire of the battery. It was a 
shell from here that set fire to Charlestown, adding to the gran- 
deur and horror of the scene. Clinton, seeing the ranks of his 
veterans reel and fall back before the murderous discharges from 
the redoubt, threw himself into a boat and crossed to the aid of 
Howe. 

The British shipping took a prominent part in this battle, 
especially the Glasgow, which lay in a position where she swept 
Charlestown Xeck with her guns, tlius preventing reinforce- 
ments passing over to the Americans, and harassing their retreat 
from the hill. An American officer told Putnam no one could 
cross that Xeck and live ; nevertheless it is stated, on tlie au- 
thority of ]\Iajor Itussell, that a number of Boston school-boys 
crossed and recrossed during' the battle. 



208 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



The Glasgow was also one of the fleet that brought the Brit- 
ish troops to Boston in 1768, The engraving is from an original 
drawing, and shows the style of naval architecture in the last 
century. 

Out of this tranquillity we can with difficulty conjure up the 

scene of carnage that once 
raged upon the hillside yon- 
der. The still, starry night 
that preceded the battle, when 
a thousand men, stacking their 
firelocks, with mattock and 
spade threw up the first ram- 
part of the Eevolution. Grid- 
ley, the veteran engineer, 
marking out the works upon 
the wet turf, with Pomeroy, 




THE GLASGOW. 



Prescott, Putnam, and many more that heard 

" The clnun that beat at Louisburg and thundered in Quebec ! " 

How strangely to their ears must have sounded the cry of the 
British sentinel, " All 's well ! " as he paced where we now 
stand. To the laborers on that sultry night this cry was hailed 
at every hour as proof of their undiscovered toil. So the de- 
fences grew, hour by hour, until the morning dawned on the 
eventful day. 

In this battle General Gage's military reputation was lost. 
By his neglect to seize and hold Charlestown heights a battle Avas 
forced upon him, with the loss of British ];)restige and twelve 
hundred of his bravest soldiers. And Howe, notwithstanding 
the bitter experience of that day, repeated the same experiment 
at Dorchester Heights before a year had passed. 

It "was once the custom to hang the escutclieon of a deceased 
head of a family from the window or over the entrance of a 
house from which a funeral was to take place until it was over. 
The last instance noted is that of Governor Hancock's uncle, 
Thomas Hancock, in 1764. Copies of the escutcheon were 
distributed among the pall-bearers, rings afterward, and gloves 



COPP'S HILL AND THE VICINITY. 20 J 

witlim fifty years. ►Scarfs were ouce given the mourners, Lut 
this w;is prohibited, in 171^4, by law, 

Before Copp's Hill was built upon so densely, it served the 
North End population as a place of promenade and recreation. 
The Common was far too distant, and wanted the attraction of 
the beautiful panorama of the harbor then to be seen from this 
eminence. The character of this quarter of the town has since 
then undergone a change, its residents no longer claiming the 
high standing once their due. The hill, fortunately for its 
preservation, is not in the line of the movement of traffic, and 
has experienced little alteration in the last twenty-five years. 

After the surrender of Quebec the Xorth-Enders made an 
unexampled bonfire on Copp's Hill. Forty-five tar-barrels, two 
cords of wood, a mast, spars, and boards, with fift}' pounds of 
powder, were set in a blaze, and must have cast a rudd}^ glow 
over the waters of the bay. This, with a similar illumination 
on Fort Hill, was paid for by the province, together with thirty- 
two gallons of rum and much beer for the people. 

Charter Street, which makes the northern boundary of the 
cemetery, takes its name from the Charter of King William III. 
Under it jNIaine, Plymouth, and Massachusetts formed a single 
provincial government. The name has stood since 1 708. 

Sir William Phips's name is closely identified with the 
street, both as a resident and for having been the first governor 
under the new charter. His residence was at the westerly cor- 
ner of Salem and Charter Streets, which long went by the name 
of Phips's Corner. The house was of Inick, alteied 1>y the 
addition of a third story in the present century, and was used 
in 1830 as an Asylum for Indigent Boys. The governor's name 
is remembered in Phips Place, near at hand. 

Governor Phips's origin was obscure. An api)rentice to a 
ship-carpenter in early youth, he is naturally found among his 
craftsmen of the Xortli End. He received knighthood for the 
recovery of £ 300,000 of treasure, in 1087, from a sunken 
Spanish galleon, near the Bahamas, all of wliich he turned 
over to the English government, receiving £ 10,000 as his 
share. He made two expeditions against Canada in 1090, — 



210 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

one against Quebec, resulting unsuccessfully, and another in 
which his fleet captured Port Royal. It is said he received liis 
appointment through the influence of Increase Mather, while 
the doctor was agent for the colony in England. 

The occasion of the governor's arrival in Boston, May, 1692, 
was one of great rejoicing. On the 16th he was escorted from 
his dwelling to the State House by the Boston Eegiment and 
com2:)anies from Charlestown, with the magistrates and people, 
not only of Boston, but the neighboring towns. The new 
charter and the governor's commission were then read from the 
balcony, according to custom, and the old governor, Bradstreet, 
vacated his oflice. A banquet closed the ceremonies. 

Dr. Cotton Mather says Phips dreamed when a poor boy 
that he would become rich and build liim a house on the Green 
Lane, the ancient name of Salem Street. He lived to realize 
his dream, and become the head of the colony. 

Sir William was a man of ungovernable temper. He assaulted 
Brenton, the collector of the port, and caned Captain Short, of 
the Nonesuch frigate. He was of large stature and great per- 
sonal strength, which made these personal conflicts undesirable 
to his foes. An instance is given of his having acted a Crom- 
wellian part. Having procured, by a bare majority, the passage 
of an act prohibiting any but residents of the town they repre- 
sented to be members of the General Court, Sir William rushed 
into the chamber and drove out the non-resident representa- 
tives, who did not stand upon the order of their going, but left 
the governor master of the field. Governor Phips was a mem- 
ber of the Old North under the ministration of the Mathers. 
Aside from his impetuous disposition, he is described as a man 
of sterling traits. He died in London in 1695, and was buried 
in the church of St. Mary Woolnoth, where a long epitaph 
commemorates his life and public services. 

Hutchinson relates that once in Sir William's absence his 
wife, whose name was Mary (William and IVIary were the 
reigning sovereigns), was applied to in behalf of a poor woman 
who had been committed under a charge of witchcraft, and that 
out of the goodness of her heart she signed a warrant for the 



COPP S HILL AND THE A'ICINITY, 



211 



woman's discharge, which mandate was obeyed by the keeper of 
the jail witliout (juestion, but with the vdtimate loss of his place. 

In Charter Street lived the ancestors of John Foster Wil- 
liams, who, in the jNIassachusetts frigate Protector, of twenty- 
six guns, sunk the English ship Admiral Duff, of thirty guns, 
diu'ing the Revolutionary War. In this action Preble, after- 
wards commodore, was a midshipman with Williams, who died 
in Boston in 1814. Foster Street, now Clark, was intended to 
perpetuate the old family. Paul Revere, the fidus Achates of 
Warren, lived and died in a house in Charter Street which he 
bought near the close of the war of Independence. It stood near 
Hanover Street, on the west side, where Revere Place now is. 

Spencer Phips^ afterwards lieutenant-governor, was origi- 
nally named David Bennet, but took the name of his Uncle 
Phips when adopted by him. He also lived in Sir William's 
house. Spencer Phips was in office while William Shirley 
was governor, and was of course overshadowed by that remark- 
able man. Phips was succeeded by Hutchinson at his death 
in 1757. 

/ Hull Street bounds the cemetery on the south. It is named 
for John Hull, through whose pasture it was laid out, and was 
conveyed to the town by Judge Samuel Sewall and wife, on 
the express condition that it should always bear that name. 

John Hull, the primitive owner of this field, is fimed as the 
coiner of the first 
money in New Eng- 
land. The scarcity 
of silver in the col- 
ony for a circulating 
medium seems to 
have rendered the 
step necessary. The 
colonists being pur- 
chasers as yet, the bullion flowed out of tli<^ country. 

In the " History and Anti(piities of Boston" it is remarked : — 

" It was no small stretch of authority for a Colony or a Proviure 
to presume to coin mone^'' ; but this Colony was now very peculiarly 




NE-TRF,E SIULLIXC. 



212 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 




situated, and its presumption in taking this step was greatly favored 
by tlie recent state of affairs in the mother country." 

The mint was established at John Hull, the silversmith's, 
house, and he and his coadjutor, Eobert Sanderson, took oath 
that all the money coined by them should " be of the just alloy 
of the English cojne ; that every shilling should be of due 
weight, namely, three penny troj weight, and all other pieces 

proportionably, so neere as 
they could." This was, in 
1652, the origin of the old 
pine - tree shilling. Hull's 
house was the same formerly 
owned by Rev. John Cotton. 
In 1654 an order of the Gen- 
eral Court prohibited the transportation out of its jurisdiction 
of more than twenty shillings " for necessary expenses " by 
any person. Searchers were appointed " to examine all packs, 
persons, trunks, chests, boxes or the like." The penalty was 
the seizure of the whole estate of the offender. 

Hull began poor, and ended rich, many of his new shillings 

finding their way into his own 

strong-box. He was a very worthy 
man, and a member of the First 
Church under Eev. John Wilson. 
He married Judith, the daughter 
of Edmund Quincy, ancestor of 

that family in New England. From her is named that much- 
dreaded point of Narragansett Bay, where Neptune exacts his 
tribute from voyagers through the Sound. It is said, moreover, 
that Hannah Hull, his daughter, received for her wedding por- 
tion her weight in pine-tree shillings when she married Judge 
Sewall, — a statement probably originating in an ingenious com- 
putation of the weight of the sum she actually received. " From 
this marriage," remarks Quincy, " has sprung the eminent family 
of- the Sewalls, which has given three chief justices to Massa- 
chusetts and one to Canada, and has been distinguished in 
every generation by the talents and virtues of its members." 




COPPS HILL AXD THE VICINITY. 



213 



Salem Street was, in 170S, from Mr. Pliips's corner in 
Charter Street to Prince Street ; from thence to Hanover it was 
Back Street. 

Christ Church spire has long dominated over tliis locality, 
and served as a landmark for vessels entering the harbor. It is 
"the oldest church in Boston standing on its original ground, 
lia\dng been, erected in 1723, — six years before the Old South. 
Of the fifteen churches built previous to 1750, only seven 
occupy their original sites ; the others may be found in the 
new city which has sprung up as if by magic in tlie old bed 
of Charles liiver. 

This was the second Episcopal Church erected in the town. 
It has been in its day considered one of the chief architectural 
ornaments of the Xortli End. The body of the church has the 
plain monotonous style peculiar to all the old houses of wor- 
sliip, but the 
steej^le — the 
design of 
Charles Ikil- 
finch — beau- 
tifies the whole 
structure. The 
old steeple was 
blown down in 
the great gale 
of 1804, fall- 
ing upon an 
old wooden 
building at the 
corner of Tiles- 
ton Street, 
through which 
it crashed, to 
the consterna- 
tion of the 
tenants, who, 
however, es- 




CHRIST CHURCH. 
1723.* 



214 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

caped injury. In rebuilding, the height was shortened about 

sixteen feet by Joseph Tucker, the 

builder. Over the entrance is a plain 

tablet with the name and date of the 

house. 

It is generally known that from this steeple — which was 
visible far and near — warning was given of the intended 
march to Lexington and Concord. Paul Eevere's narrative 
gives -a relation of the method : — 

"On Tuesday evening, the 18th of April, 1775, it was observed 
that a number of soldiers were marching towards Boston Common. 
About ten o'clock Dr. Warren sent in great haste for me, and begged 
that I would immediately set off for Lexington, where were Hancock 
and Adams, and acquaint them of the movement, and that it was 
thought they were tlie objects. The Sunday before, by desire of 
Dr. Warren, I had been to Lexington to see Hancock and Adams, 
who were at Rev, Mr. Clark's. 

" I returned at night, through Charlestown. There I agreed with 
a Colonel Conant and some other gentlemen that if the British went 
out by water we would show two lanterns hi the North Church 
steeple, and if by land, one, as a signal ; for we were apprehensive it 
would be difficult to cross Charles River, or get over Boston Neck. 
I left Dr. Warren, called upon a friend, and desired him to make the 
signals. I then went home, took my boots and surtout, went to the 
north part of the town, where I had kept a boat. Two friends rowed 
me across Charles River, a little to the eastward, where the Somerset 
lay. It was then young flood ; the ship was winding, and the moon 
was rising. They landed me on the Charlestown side. When I got 
into town, I met Colonel Conant and several others. They said they 
had seen our signals." 

Within tlie steeple are hung a chime of bells, placed there 
in 1744, — the first Avhose cadences gladdened the town. 

" Low at times and loud at times, 
And clianging like a poet's rhymes, 
Rang the beautiful wild chimes. " 

These bells were from the fixmous West of England foundry 
of Abel Rudhall, of Gloucester, whose bells have been heard 
in many a town and hamlet of " Merrie England," Each had 
an inscription containing its own and much contemporary his- 
tory, as follows : — 



COPP'S HILL AND THE VICINITY. 215 

FIRST BELL. 

" Tliis peal of eight bells is the gift of a number of generous persons to Girist 
Church, in Boston, N. E., Anno 174-4. A. R." 

SECOND BELL. 

"Tliis Church was founded in the year 1723. Timothy Cutler, D. D., the 
first Rector. A. R. 1723." 

THIRD BELL. 

" We are the first ring of bells cast for the British Empire in North America. 
A. R. 1744." 

FOURTH BELL. 

" God preserve the Church of England. 1744." 

FIFTH BELL. 

"William Shirley, Esq., Governor of the Massachusetts Bay, in New Eng- 
land. Anno 1744." 

SIXTH BELL. 

" The subscription for these bells was begun by John Hammock and Robert 
Temple, Churcli Wardens, Anno 1743 ; completed by Robert Jenkins and 
John Gould, Church Wardens, Anno 1744." 

SEVENTH BELL. 

*' Since generosity has opened our mouths, our tongues shall ring aloud its 
praise. 1744." 

EIGHTH BELL. 

"Abel Rudhall, of Gloucester, cast us all. Anno 1744." 

The chimes or " ring of bells," were obtained in England by 
Dr. Cutler, and were consecrated there. Tliey were invested 
with the power to dispel evil spirits, — according to p()])idar 
belief. The same bells still hang in the belfry. Their carillon, 
vil)rating harmony on the air of a quiet Sabbath, summons the 
tliird generation for whom they have proclainuMl " ('dory to God 
in the highest, and on earth peace, good-will toward men." 

The chandeliers used formerly in the church were given by 
that Captain Gruchy we visited not long since. ^Irs. Crocker's 
relation is, that they were taken from a Spanisli vessel by one 
of Gruchy's privateers, and found their way to a Protestant 
Church instead of a Catholic Cathedral, as was intended. Dr. 
Cutler, the first rector, lived on the corner of Tileston and 
Salem Streets, in close proximity to tlie church. 

The height of tower and .steeple is ITo feet, and the ag^nvgato 
weight of the bells 7,272 pounds; the smallest weigliing G20 



216 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

pounds, the largest 1,545. General Gage, it is said, witnessed 
from Christ Church steeple the burning of Charlestown and 
battle of Bunker Hill. 

In this church is the first monument ever erected to the 
memory of Washington in our country. Dr. Byles, the rector, 
left Boston in 1775, and went to St. Johns, New Brunswick, 
Avhere he was settled as rector and cure of the church of that 
place. This Dr. Byles was the son of Eev. Mather Byles, the 
punning parson of Hollis Street. There does not appear to 
have been a settled pastor after this until 1778. 

The interior has been considerably changed by alterations. 
Formerly there was a centre aisle, now closed, as is also the 
large altar window. The chancel is decorated with paintings 
creditably executed by a Boston artist. The walls of the church 
are of great strength, being two feet and a half thick ; the 
brick are laid in the style of the last century, in what is termed 
the English Bond, of which but a few specimens remain in 
Boston. 

Like many of the old Boston churches, this has its vaults 
underneath for the reception of the dead, and with them, of 
course, its legendary lore. In, Shaw it is recorded that 

" In 1812, while the workmen were employed building tombs, one 
of them found the earth so loose that he settled his l)ar into it the 
wliole length with a single effort. The superintendent directed him 
to proceed till he found solid earth. About six feet below the bot- 
tom of the cellar he found a coffin covered with a coarse linen cloth 
sized Avith gum, which, on boiling, became white, and the texture as 
firm as if it had recently been woven. Within this coffin was another, 
protected from the air in a similar manner, and the furniture was 
not in the least injured by time. The flesh was sound, and some- 
what reseml)ling that of an Egyptian mummy. The skin, when 
cut, reseml)led leather. The sprigs of evergreen, deposited in the 
coffin, resembled the broad-leaved myrtle ; the stem was elastic ; the 
leaves fresh and apparently in a state of vegetation. From the in- 
scription it was found to be the body of a Mr. Thomas, a native of 
New England, who died in Bermuda. Some of his familv were 
amono- the founders .of Christ Church. His remains, when discov- 
ereil, had been entombed about eighty years." 



COPP'S HILL AND THE VICINITY. 217 

]\Iajor Pitcairn's remains were interred under tliis church, 
and thereby hangs another legend. After being twice wounded, 
Pitcairn raUied his men for a third assault, and received his 
death- wound while entering the redoubt, falling into the arms 
of his own son, who bore him to the boat. He was brought 
across the river and taken to the house of Mr. Stoddard, boat- 
builder, near the ferry, where he bled to death in a short time. 

Pitcairn was a large, portly man, and so was Lieutenant Shea, 
wdiose remains were also deposited under the church. The lat- 
ter died of fever ; and when, some time after the events of the 
Revolution, the body of Pitcairn was sent for by his relatives 
in England, it is said that of Lieutenant Shea was forwarded 
by mistake. The sexton was at a loss to identify the remains, 
but the presence of a large blistering plaster on the head of the 
body he sent to England seems to point to a blunder on his 
part. It has been questioned whether the monument in "West- 
minster Abbey to Pitcairn commemorates his bravery and death 
on the battle-field, or that of a man who died from inflinnma- 
tion of the brain in his bed. 

Pitcairn will always be remembered as the leader of the ad- 
vance-guard who fired on the provincials at Lexington, and 
began the great drama of the Revolution. He always main- 
tained that the minute-men fired first, which those present on 
the American side warndy disputed. This circumstance has 
associated Pitcairn's name with undeserved obloquy, for he was 
a brave officer and a kind-hearted man. Of all the British 
officers in Boston, he alone, it is said, dealt justly and inqiar- 
tially by the townspeople in their disputes with the troops. 
His men were warmly attached to him, and declared thoy had 
lost a father when he fell. Gage sent his own i)hysician to 
attend him. The bullet which laid the gallant marine low was 
fired by a negro soldier from Salem. The regiment wliieli he 
commanded arrived from England in the latter part of J Decem- 
ber, 1774, in the Asia, Boyne, and Somerset. 

Rev. William ]\rontague, rector of Christ Church, was the 
person to whom Arthur Savage gave the ball whicli killed AVar- 
ren at Bunker Hill. The identity of this ball has been disputed 
10 



218 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

by some of the martyr's descendants, on the ground that it was 
said to have been taken from the body, while Warren received 
his death from a ball in the head. The controversy was main- 
tained with considerable warmth on both sides, the general 
opinion favoring the authenticity of the fatal bullet. Arthur 
Savage was an officer of the customs in Boston, and his state- 
ment that he took the piece of lead from Warren's body is 
worthy of belief. Mr. Montague is said to have been the 
first American Episcopal clergyman ordained in America who 
preached in an English pulpit. The English officers billeted 
in this quarter of the town attended Christ Church. 

Tileston Street is the Love Lane of our ancestors, not from 
the Hymeneal Deity, — else we may believe it would have been 
the favorite resort of the North End damsels and their love- 
lorn swains. It was thus named from the Love family, who 
owned most of the street. INIrs. Susannah Love sold the ground 
on which the Eliot School was built, and the name of the lane 
was changed about 1820, for good old Master John Tileston of 
that school. Master Tileston presided over the school for two 
tliirds of a century, and after he became superannuated his salary 
was continued ; the only instance of the kind in the history of 
the town or city. He lived at the westerly corner of Margaret 
and Prince Streets. ]\Iather Byles is said to have first seen the 
light in Tileston Street. 

Tlie first Grammar School in this part of the town was erected 
in Bennet Street in 1713, and was called the North Latin School. 
Eecompense Wadsworth was the first master. A writing-school 
was built on the same lot, on Love Lane, in 1718 ; and in 1741, 
when an enumeration was made, this school had more pupils 
than all the others combined. Up to 1800 there were but 
seven schools in the town, and only nine when Boston became 
a city. Bennet Street was for some time distinguished as North 
Latin School Street. The old schools were known later as the 
North Grammar and North Writing, the subsequent name of 
Eliot being given to honor the memory of the pastors of the 
Old North Church. Since the city government went into opera- 
tion it seems to have passed into a custom to name the schools 



COPP'S HILL AND THE VICINITY. 219 

for the mayors. The old school-house stood hy tlie side of the 
present one, and was the third in the town. Captain Thomas 
Hutchinson, father of the too-celebrated lieutenant-governor, 
built tlie house and gave it to the town. Three or four edifices 
have succeeded the original, the present structure having been 
dedicated on Forefather's Day, 1859. Mather Byles, Edward 
Everett, and Dr. Jenks are among the distinguished pupils of 
the school. Edward Everett lived, in 1802, in Proctor's Lane, 
now the easterly part of Richmond Street, and in 1804 removed 
to Richmond Street. His motlier afterwards removed to Xew 
bury, now AYashington Street, to a house nearly opposite the 
head of Essex Street. 

The modern school acquired some notoriety in 1859, from a 
rebellion of the Catholic pupils against the reading of the Ten 
Commandments, which caused no little excitement in the old 
North End. Various attempts have been made from time to 
time to prohibit the reading of the Scriptures in the public 
schools, one of whicli gave rise to the following mot of Rufus 
Choate : " What ! banish the Bible from schools ! Never, while 
there is a piece of Plymouth Rock left large enough to make a 
gun-flint of!" 

At Prince Street we reach the old line of division between 
Salem Street proper and Back Street. The origin of Salem and 
Lynn Streets are obvious. Back Street was thus distinguished 
from Fore, through whicli our readers have followed us in a 
former chapter. Prince, named from some scion of royalty, has 
outlived King and Queen. This street was originally from Han- 
over (^liddle) to the sea, but now reaches into North S(iuare, 
its easterly terminus. The portion between Salem and Hanover 
was anciently known as Black Horse Lane, from an old tavern 
on the corner of Back Street. This tavern, corrupted into 
Black-us-inn, was noted as a place of refuge and concealment 
for deserters from Burgoyne's army at Cambridge. It was of 
considerable antirpiity, the lane being so called before 1700. 
The royal regulars had barracks on the corner of Prince and 
Salem Streets in 1775-76. 

Salem Church, at the corner of North Bennet and Salem 



220 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Streets, was organized in 1827. Its formation was coeval with 
the church in Pine Street, and the dedication occurred January 
1, 1828, at which time Eev. Justin Edwards, D. D., was in- 
stalled. Dr. George W. Blagden, who has recently resigned the 
pastorate of the Old South, was settled here. The building 
has a simple, substantial look, but may be classed with those 
of no special attractive features. 

Though we would fain linger in the old North End, other 
sections claim our attention. In it the spirit of resistance to 
British tyranny was strongly developed, and it contained less 
of the tory element than some other quarters of the town. 
The sturdy mechanics of the I^orth End were ever ready to act 
in the cause of liberty, no matter what the sacrifice might be. 
Many of her sons gained a noble reputation in the wars of the 
republic. There was that old sea-lion, John Manly, who held the 
first naval commission issued by Washington, in 1775. He took, 
in the Lee, the dangerous cruising-ground of Boston Bay, and 
captured, in November, the British ordnance brig Nancy, a prize 
so important to the Continental army that the camps were wild 
with joy. Among other pieces taken was a heavy brass mortar, 
which Old Put mounted with a bottle of rum in his hand, while 
Mifilin christened it the " Congress." The Lee made other im- 
portant captures; and in 1776 ^lanly was given command of 
the Hancock frigate, in which he captured the Eox, British 
man-of-war, but was himself taken prisoner by the Rainbow, a 
much heavier vessel than his own. He commanded afterwards 
the Jason and Hague, in both of which he gave evidence that 
he was a worthy comrade of Paul Jones. Manly was a bluff* but 
indiscreet seaman, and for some irregularity was court-martialled. 
He died in 1793, at his house in Charter Street. 

Another naval hero, still more renowned, was Commodore 
Samuel Tucker of the old Continental navy, who lived in a 
three-story brick building on the north side of Elect Street, 
where now stands a brick stable. 

His first cruise was in 1776, with a commission signed by 
Samuel Adams in his pocket, and a pine-tree flag at his peak, 
made by the hands of his wife. This intrepid sailor took from 



corr's HILL and the vicinity. 221 

the enemy during the war sixty-two sail of vessels, more than 
six hundred cannon, and three thousand prisoners, ami when 
at length compelled to surrender the old ^Boston frigate, which 
he then commanded, to the British squadron at Charleston, he 
kept his flag flying until Admiral Arbuthnot sent him a special 
order to lower it. Tucker's reply was, " I do not think much 
of striking my flag to your present force ; but I have struck 
more of your flags than are now flying in this har])or." 

Commodore Tucker carried John Adams to Bordeaux in 1778, 
"through the six-and-twenty misfortunes of HarkHpiin." l)ur- 
ing this voyage the sliip was struck by lightning, and the Com- 
modore narrowly escaped death from the fragments of a falling 
spar. His ser\dces, which it is believed were unsurpassed by 
those of any of his comrades of the old navy, met with tardy 
requital from the nation. According to his l)iogra})her, ^Ir. 
Sheppard, he retired in 1793 to a farm in Bristol, ^Maine. 
John Adams, in speaking of a visit from Tucker, says, " When 
I see or hear of or from one of these old ^len, whether in 
civil, political, military, or naval service, my heart feels." 

The brave Lieutenant James Sigourney, who commanded the 
armed schooner Asp, and fell heroically flghting in an engage- 
ment with a British flotilla in Chesapeake Bay in 1812, — Cap- 
tain Samuel XeA\anan, lieutenant in Craft's Artillery in the early 
part of the Revolution; serving in the navy under Xicholson in 
the Deane in 1782 ; killed in St. Clair's battle Avith the :\liami 
Indians, — Colonel Josiah Snelling, flghting against the Indians 
and distinguished at Tippecanoe ; afterwards at York, Platts- 
burg, and other fields ; finally colonel of the 5th United States 
infantry, and giving his name to Fort Snelling, — Colonel John 
Mountfort, bre vetted for gallantry at Piatt sburg, and distin- 
guished in the Florida war, — Captain Samuel ^Vrmstrong, a sol- 
dier of 1812, — and Lieutenant Bobert Keith, wlio served under 
Macomb at Plattsburg ; all lived in the North I'Jid. 

Kext north of Christ Chun^h was a large brick building, end 
to the street, occupied more than fifty years ago as a type and 
stereotype foundry ; a part of the site next the church av;;s 
afterwards used for an academy. The north corner of Tileston, 



222 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

at its junction with Hanover Street, was the home of Professor 
Henry J. Eipley, of the Newton Theological Institute. 

At the northerly corner of Sheaffe and Salem Streets was the 
residence of Dr. Samuel Stillman, the well-known pastor of the 
First Baptist Church from 17G5 to his death in 1807. From 
him Stillman Street takes its name. He preached eloquently 
in the cause of liberty in his house of worship in the rear of 
Salem, near Stillman Street. This church, once cowering under 
the lash of bigotry, seeking to hide itself in an obscure corner 
of the town, is now translated to tlie highest eminence in the 
city, and towers majestically over the neighboring steeples. 

The First Baptist Church, like the Episcopal, had to struggle 
against the determination of the magistrates, backed by a ma- 
jority of the people, to permit no other church than their own 
to obtain a foothold in their midst. A few individuals consti- 
tuted the church in Charlestown in May, 1665, but were driven 
by persecution to a private dwelling on Noddle's Island. They 
erected their church in Boston without exciting the suspicion 
of the authorities, until its dedication in February, 1679. This 
act of contumacy was summarily dealt with. The church doors 
were nailed up, and the following notice posted upon them : — 

" All persons are to take notice, that by order of the court, the 
doors of this house are shut up, and that they are inhibited to hold 
any meeting, or to open the doors thereof, without license from au- 
thority, till the General Court take further order, as they will 
answer the contrary at their peril. 

" Dated at Boston 8th March 1680, Edward Rawson Secretary." 

The first house was erected on the banks of the ]\Iill Pond, 
on the north side of Stillman Street, between Salem and Pond 
(now Endicott) Streets. This house was replaced by a larger 
one, also of wood, in 1771, and abandoned in 1829, when the 
society took possession of the brick building now standing at 
the corner of Hanover and Union Streets. This was in turn 
vacated in 1858 for the edifice in Somerset Street. 

In Baldwin Place — since become the Home of Little AVan- 
derers — is the house of the Second Baptist Church. This so- 
ciety organized in 1743, and held their first services at the house 



COPP'S HILL AND THE VICINITY. 223 

of James Bowncl in SheafFc Street, near Copp's Hill, removing 
later to Proctor's School-house, until March, 174G, when they 
took possession of their new building upon the spot first men- 
tioned. The first house was of wood, and quite small, having 
near the head of the broad aisle a basin for baptismal purposes. 
It was superseded, in 1810, by the present brick structure. 

In Salem Street was the old printing-office of Zachariah 
Fowle, — first the master and then the partner of Isaiah Thomas, 
— in which was printed the old Massachusetts Spy in 1770, 
until Thomas dissolved his connection with Fowle and opened 
his office in School Street, near the Latin School. Thomas, 
whose paper was a high organ of liberty, was ordered to appear 
once before Governor Hutchinson for a pubKcation reflecting on 
the executive, but refused to go. He removed his types, press, 
etc., to Worcester a few days before the battle of Lexington. 
This was the origin of the Worcester Spy. Later he opened a 
bookstore at 45 Xewbury Street, under the name of Thomas and 
Andrews, but did not reside in Boston. Oliver Ditson & Co. 
now occupy the spot. 

Many old buildings still remain in Salem, Prince, Charter, 
and the neighboring streets. Over the apothecary's door, at the 
corner of Salem and Prince Streets, is an antique head of JEs- 
culapius, or some follower of the curative art, which is the 
oldest sign now known in the North End. Many years ago it 
stood at the edge of tlie sidewalk affixed to a post, but, ob- 
structing the way, it was removed. This is believed to be the 
oldest apothecary's stand in Boston now used for that purjiose. 
Eobert Fennelly was the ancient dispenser of pills and purga- 
tives on this corner. 

In the slums of the North End originated the draft riot of 
1863. The officers who attempted to serve the notices in 
Prince Street were cruelly beaten, and the mob, gathering 
courage from its triumph over a handful of police, reinforced 
from the purlieus of Endicott, Charlestown, and neighboring 
streets, made an attempt to seize the cannon kept at the gun- 
house in Cooper Street, Avhich was held by a little band of 
regulars from Fort Warren. The rioters had killed and wounded 



224 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

several of the garrison, and had nearly succeeded in demolish- 
ing the doors, when the guns were discharged into the mob with 
fatal effect. After withstanding for a few moments the fusil- 
lade from the small arms of the soldiers, the crowd gave way, 
moving towards Dock Square, where they expected to secure a 
supply of weapons by breaking open the store of William lieed 
and other dealers in arms in that vicinity. Eight of the rioters 
were known to have been killed, but those who fell were re- 
moved by their friends, and no authentic data can be given. 

Traces of this affair may yet be seen in the dwelling opposite 
the gun-house, the brick walls of which were scarred by the 
discharge of grape at point-blank distance. 



THE OLD SOUTH AND PIiOVl^XE HOUSE. 225 



CHAPTEE YIII. 

THE OLD SOUTH AND PROVINCE HOUSE. 

Marlborough Street. — Governor Winthrop . — Old South. — Warren's Ora- 
tions. — Tea-Party Meeting. — British Occupation. — Phillis Wheatley. — 
Spring Lane. — Heart and CroAVu. — Boston Evening Post. — Province 
House. — Samuel Shute. — William Burnet. — William Shirley. — Thomas 
Pownall. — Francis Bernard. — General Gage. — Lexington Expedition. — 
Sir William Howe. — Comicil of War. — Court Dress and IManners. — 
Governor Strong. — Blue Bell and Indian Queen. — Lieutenant-Governor 
Gushing. — Josiah Quiucy, Jr. — Mayor Qmncy. 

THAT part of AYashington Street lying between Scliool and 
Summer Streets was, in 1 708, named jNIarlborougli Street, 
from the great duke whom Thackeray irreverently calls Jack 
Churchill, — the man of Blenheim, Eamillies, Oudenarde, and 
]\Ialplaquet. The Marlboro Hotel still perpetuates the name. 

As we stand at the south corner of School Street at its union 
with Washington, a collection of old buildings faces us extend- 
ing from the yard of the church nearly to Spring Lane. This, 
together with the church property, was a part of the estate of 
one of the greatest men among the early colonists, John AVin- 
throp. The house of the first governor of this band of Puritans 
stood nearly opposite to us. It was of wood, the frame being 
removed from Cambridge, or Newtown as the early settlers then 
called it. This removal was the cause of a misunderstanding 
between the governor and the deputy, Dudley, but matters 
were accommodated to the content of both parties. In the 
Introduction some account is given of the character of "Win- 
throp's ha})itation, which remained standing nearly a century and 
a half, until demolished by the British soldiery in 1775. So 
the roof that sheltered Winthrop went to light the mess-fires 
of liis Majesty's troops, or to diffuse warmtli through tlie apart- 
ments of Gage or Howe in the Province House. 

The life of Winthrop is the history of the Colony. It ai>- 
10* o 



226 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

pears in connection with its affairs, or the biographies of his 
contemporaries. Under his rule church and state were one ; 
and the idea of tolerating any belief but their own was repug- 
nant to the practice, whatever may have been the theory, of the 
then colonists. Winthrop was one of the first selectmen of 
Boston, and more than any other moulded its government. 
The remarkable affair of Anne Hutcliinson, in which so many 
persons of importance were participants, shook to its centre the 
social and religious fabric Winthrop had assisted to raise, and 
left him at variance with Sir Henry Yane, next to himself the 
most considerable man in the infant colony. His rule was iron 
towards all who professed any but the orthodox faith, until a 
short time before his death, when, it is said, he refused to sign 
an order for the banishment of some dissenting person, saying to 
Dudley that he had done too much of that work already. The 
Pequot war, begun while Vane was governor, ended under 
Winthrop. So far as the neighboring Indians were concerned, 
the governor maintained peace by a firm yet conciliatory policy. 
The chiefs were entertained at his table, and greatly edified by 
the governer's domestic economy. Chicataubut refused to eat 
until his host said grace, and received at his departure a suit 
of the governor's clothes, in which he strutted home to his 
wigwam with increased importance. 

According to the modern view, the governor did not favor 
popular government ; his opinion being that wisdom resided in 
the few. As a man he was less inflexible than as a magistrate, 
for it is related that he reclaimed a thief whom he detected 
stealing his wood in the following manner. " Friend," said the 
governor, " it is a very cold season, and I doubt you are poorly 
provided with wood ; you are welcome to supply yourself at my 
pile till the winter is over." The governor had four wives, and 
lost not only three of these, but six children. His death occurred 
on the 26th of March, 1G49, at the age of sixty-one. H^e was 
entombed in King's Chapel Ground, on the north side. One 
of his sons became governor of Connecticut, and shares his 
tomb ; a beautiful statue of Winthrop, by Greenough, is in the 
chapel at Mount Auburn. The governor left a journal of his 



THE OLD SOUTH AND rROVINCE HOUSE. 



227 



voyage from Eiiglaud, and of the proceedings in the colony up 
to his decease, which was edited by James Savage. fSome of 
the admirers of Governor Winthrop's character have declared 
him -worthy of canonization, had we like Kome a sacred cal- 
ender. 

The Old South still stands, one of the monuments of Old 
Boston. Its existence has been often threatened, and erelong per- 
haps will be swept from its foundations, to appear in new and 
strange habiliments in a 
remote part of the city. 
It is the richest church 
corporation in the city, 
and, next to Old Trinity 
of Kew York, in the 
country. The Winthrop 
estate passed through 
Thatcher and j\Irs. Nor- 
ton to the church, and 
in consequence of its 
central location has be- 
come of great value. Its 
parishioners once dwelt 
within sight of its stee- 
ple, but now few can be 
found Avithin sound of 
its bell. Milk Street, 
Franklin Street, Sum- 
mer and Winter, Brom- 
field and School, have 
hardly a residence left. 
Two of them at least the old 

M-ere once filled with the abodes of the most respectablf inhab- 
itants of the city, but commerce has said " Move on ! " and tlic 
the population has vanished before it. 

Curiously enough, the Old South, arising from a schism in 
the First Church, like it originated in Charlestown, where also 
was organized the First Baptist Society. Like the Baptists, 







228 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

also, this society was proclaimed against, but erected a house 
of worship, the third in Boston. The theological disputes, 
questions of doctrine or church government in which this 
society originated, however interesting^ cannot be given here. 
Thomas Thacher was the lirst minister, settled in February, 
1670. The first house was of wood, and stood until 1729, 
when it was taken down to give place to the then new brick 
edifice. In the front was placed, in 1867, a tablet bearing the 
.following inscription, so that all who run may thus read a little 
of the history of the church : — 



OLD SOUTH. 

Church gathered 1669. 

First House built 1670. 

This House erected, 1729. 

Desecrated by British Troops, 1775-6. 



This little memorial contains a succinct account of the church 
even to the last line, " Desecrated by British Troops," which 
was strenuously objected to by many at the time the tablet was 
placed there. The occupation of churches by troops has been 
common in all wars, notably so in the late Eebellion. Such 
occupation has not been generally considered as calling for a 
new consecration, and the use of the word " desecrated " is per- 
haps not fortunate, though the usage of this house was pecu- 
liary malicious and repugnant. The name " Old South " goes 
no further back than the building of the "New South," in 
Summer Street, in 1717. It was primarily the South Meeting- 
house, being then considered in the south part of the town. 
On a stone at the southwest corner of the church is sculp- 
tured, "N. E. (Newly Erected) March 31, 1729." 

The possession of the South Meeting-house by Sir Edmund 
Andros has been stated in connection with King's Chapel. 
From this church, in 1688, was buried Lady Andros, wife of 
the arbitrary Knight. The governor' ts house was doubtless in 
the immediate vicinity of Cotton Hill, as from Jfldge Sewall's 
account of the funeral we learn thvxt " the corpse was carried 



THE OLD SOUTH AND PKOVINCE HOUSE. 220 

into the hearse drawn by six horses, the soldiers making a 
guard from the Governor's house down the Prison L;inu to 
the South Meeting House." The tomb of Lady Anne An- 
dros was identified by the care of a relative, who found a 
slab, Avith her name inscribed, while repairing her last resting- 
place. 

jS'one of the city churches are so rich in historical associa- 
tions as this. Here Lovell, Church, AVarren, and Hancock 
delivered their orations on the anniversaries of the Massacre. 
When Warren delivered his second address in March, 1775, 
an officer of the AYelsh Fusileers, Captain Chapman, held up to 
his view a number of pistol-bullets, at the same time exclaim- 
ing, " Fie ! fie ! " This was construed to be a cry of fire, and 
threw the house into confusion until quieted by AVilliam Coo- 
per, wliile Warren dropped a handkerchief over the officer's 
hand. Many other officers were present with the purpose, as 
was thought, to overawe the speaker. But Warren was not to 
be overawed. At the same time the 47th regiment, returning 
from parade, passed the Old South, when Colonel JVTesbit, the 
commander caused the drums to beat with the view of drown- 
ing the orator's voice. 

A AATiter thus describes the events of that day : — 

" The day came and the weather was remarkably fine. The Old 
South Meeting-house was crowded at an early hour. The British 
otiicers occupied the aisles, the flight of steps to the pulji^it, and 
several of them were within it. It is not precisely knoAVTi whether 
this was accident or design. The orator with the assistance of his 
friends made his entrance at the window by a ladder. The officers, 
seeing his coohiess and intrepidity, made way for him to advance 
and address the audience. An awful stillness preceiled his exor- 
dium. Each man felt the palpitations of his own heart, and saw 
the pale but determined face of his neighbor. The speaker began 
his oration m a firm tone of voice, and proceeded with gre;it energy 
and pathos. Warren and his friends were prepared to chiistise con- 
tumely, prevent disgrace, and avenge an attempt at assassination." 

In the old church Benjamin Franklin was baptized. In the 
new, was held the famous Tea-Party meeting, adjourned from 



230 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

raiieuil Hall because the crowd was too great to be contained 
there. It is believed that Samuel Adams had with others con- 
trived this assemblage to draw off attention from their plans, 
already matured and waiting only the signal of execution. 
Certain it is that the Mohawks appeared precisely at the mo- 
ment when negotiation had failed to prevent the landing of the 
tea. At this meeting was made the first suggestion to dispose 
of the tea in the way finally adopted. John Eowe, who lived 
in Pond Street, now Bedford, said, " Who knows how tea will 
mingle with salt w^ater 1 " The idea was received with great 
laughter and approval. It is from the same Eowe that Eowe 
Street took its name. 

Governor Hutchinson was at this time at his country-seat 
in Milton, — afterwards occupied by Barney Smith, Esq., — 
where he received a committee from the meeting, who made a 
final demand that the cargoes of tea should be sent away. The 
governor, however, refused to interfere in the matter. It is re- 
lated that he was afterwards informed that a mob was on its 
way to visit him, and that he left his house with his face half 
shaven, making the best of his way across the fields to a place 
of safety. 

During the absence of the committee Josiah Quincy, Jr., 
made an eloquent speech. When the deputation returned with 
their unfavorable report, about sunset, the Indian yell was 
heard at the church door, and the band of disguised Mohawks 
since so famous in history, filled the street. The meeting 
broke up in confusion, notwithstanding the efi'orts of Sam- 
uel Adams to detain the people, who rushed forth into the 
street. The Indians, after their momentary pause, took their 
way through Milk Street directly to Griffin's, now Liverpool 
Wharf. 

The number of the simulated Indians has been variously 
estimated at from sixteen to eighty. Their disguise Avas eff'ected 
in a carpenter's shop, where Joseph Lovering, a boy of twelve, 
held the candle for the masqueraders. They wore paint and 
carried hatchets. Under their blankets were concealed many a 
laced and ruffled coat. " Depend upon it," says Jolm Adams, 
^' they were no ordinary Mohawks." 



THE OLD SOUTH AND PROVINCE HOUSE. 231 

The Avomen of Boston Avcre not behind the men in thuir op- 
position to the tea-duty ; many, doubtless, keenly felt the loss 
of their favorite beverage. The ladies had their meetings, at 
which they resolved not to use the obnoxious herb. II(^re is 
the lament of one matron over her empty urn : — 

" Farewell the tea-board, with its gaudy equipage 
Of cups and saucers, cream-Lucket, sugar-tongs. 
The pretty tea-chest, also, lately stored 
With Hyson,' Congou, and best double fine. 
Full luany a joyous moment have I sat by ye. 
Hearing the girls tattle, the old maids talk scandal. 
And the spruce coxcomb laugh at — maybe — nothing. 
Though nov/ detestable. 
Because I am taught (and I believe it true) 
Its use will fasten slavish chains iipon my country, 
To reign Triumphant in America." 

The occupation of the Old South by troops was at the in- 
stance of General John Burgoyne. It was his regiment, the 
Queen's Light Dragoons, that set np the riding-school in the 
House of God, overthrowing its sacred memorials, and transform- 
ing it into a circus. These brave troopers never showed their 
colors outside the fortifications. The pulpit and pews were all 
removed and burnt, and many hundred loads of gravel carted 
in and spread upon the floor. The east gallery was reserved 
for spectators of the feats of horsemanship, while a bar fitted 
up in the first gallery ofi'ered means of refreshment. " The 
beautiful carved pew of Deacon Hubbard, with the silken hang- 
ings, was taken down and carried to 's house by an ofiicer 

and made a hog stye." '^ The south door was closed, and a leap- 
ing-bar placed for the horses. It has been stated that some of 
the valuable books and manuscripts of Bev. Thomas Prince 
went for fuel during the winter, as did also the adjoining par- 
sonage house, and the noble sycamore-trees that skirted the 
grass-plot in front. 

After the surrender of Burgoyne his army marched to Cam- 
bridge. General Heath, then commanding in Boston, invdted 
Sir John to dine with him, and he appeared in response to the 
invitation, liringing with him riiilli])S and liiedesel. After dinner 

* Newell's Diary. Tliaclier's Military Journal. 



232 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Burgoyne desired to go out of town by way of Charlestown, and 
General Heath accompanied him to the ferry. The curiosity to 
see the prisoners was very great, and the inhabitants crowded 
the streets, windows, and even the house-tops, to gratify it. As 
the procession was passing the Province House, General Bur- 
goyne observed to the other generals, " There is the former 
residence of the governor." Some one in the crowd who heard 
the remark said, in an audible voice, " And on the other side is 
the riding-school." 

A good anecdote is told of the hero of Portugal and Flanders 
while the prisoner of Gates. " In the height of jocular con- 
versation Burgoyne told the victor of Saratoga that he was 
more ht for a midwife than a general. 'Acknowledged,' said 
Gates, ' for I have delivered you of seven thousand men.' " 

While the regulars held possession of the church, an incident 
occurred which frightened the more superstitious among them, 
so that it was difficult to maintain a guard, as was the custom, 
at the church door. Among the troops were a good many 
Scotch Presbyterians, who were not a little fearful of retribu- 
tive justice for their abuse of the place. Some one, knowing 
the Scotch belief in apparitions, appeared to the sentinel as 
the ghost of Dr. Sewall. The Scot yelled with affright to the 
guard stationed at the Province House, and was with difficulty 
pacified. 

When D'Estaing's fleet lay in Boston harbor, in September, 
1778, the British fleet, of twenty sail, hove in sight. It was 
discovered and the alarm given by Mr. Jolm Cutler from the 
steeple of the Old South. Admiral D'Estaing, who was on 
shore, immediately put off* for the squadron, and the militia 
were ordered to the Castle and the works on Noddle's and 
George's Island, Dorchester Heights, etc., but the enemy made 
no attempt. The same fleet afterwards made the descent on 
New Bedford and Martha's Vineyard. 

The old church has been considerably changed in its interior. 
It was one of the last to retain the square pews, elevated pulpit, 
and sounding-board. The upper gallery was altered, a new 
organ obtained, and the brush of modern art applied to the 



THE OLD SOUTH AND PROVINCE HOUSE. 233 

ceilings ; otlierwdse the house remains much the same as wlicn 
erected. It had a narrow escape from destruction hy lire many 
years ago, but was saved by superhuman ellbrts on the part of 
Isaac Harris, the mast-maker, who ascended to the roof while 
it was on fire, and succeeded in extinguishing the flames. For 
this brave act he received a silver pitcher. 

One of Dr. Sewall's flock was Phillis Wheatley, a woman of 
color and a slave. She was a pure African, brought to America 
in 1761, and yet she possessed genius of a high order. She 
was, in a great measure, self taught, never having received any 
school education, yet wrote admirable verses. Her poems were 
collected in a thin volume and pubhshed in London, and have 
also been reprinted in this country. One of her effusions, ad- 
dressed to Washington, may be found in Sparks's " Life of 
Washington " ; it brought an acknowledgment from the general, 
then at Cambridge, also printed therein. She accom^Danied the 
son of her master to London in 1773, where she received great 
notice from the nobility, but soon returned to Boston, where 
she contracted an unhappy marriage, and died not long after in 
utter destitution at her house in Court Street. The genuine- 
ness of her poems was attested by Governors Hutchinson, Han- 
cock, Bowdoin, her master Wheatley, and ahnost every clergy- 
man in Boston. The following extract is from her Hymn to 
the Evening : — 

" Filled with the praise of Him who gives the light, 
And draws the sable curtains of the night, 
Let placid slumbers soothe each weary mind, 
At mom to wake, more heavenly, more refined ; 
So shall the labors of the day begin 
More pure, more guarded from the snares of sin. 
Night's leaden sceptre seals my drowsy eyes ; 
Then cease my song, till fair Aurora rise." 

We have spoken of the trees that of yore graced the green 
before the governor's house and church. A single horse-chestnut 
waves its scanty foliage behind the church on the Milk Street 
side. 

If you look closely at the masonry of the Old South you will 
notice that each course is laid with the side and end of the 



234 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

brick alternating ; this is known as the Flemish Bond. The 
West Church, Old Brattle Street, Park Street, and some others, 
have walls built in the same manner. Gawen Brown, of Bos- 
ton, made the first clock, esteemed the finest in America. The 
Prince library was deposited in the tower. 

Spring Lane recalls the ancient Spring-gate, the natural foun- 
tain at which Winthrop and Johnson stooped to quench their 
thirst, and from which, no doubt, Madam Wintlirop and Anne 
Hutchinson filled their flagons for domestic use. The gentle- 
women may have paused here for friendly chat, if the rigor of 
the governor's opposition to the schismatic Anne did not forbid. 
The handmaid of Elder Thomas Oliver, Winthrop's next neigh- 
bor on the oj)posite corner of the Spring-gate, fetched her pitcher, 
like another Eebecca, from this well ; and grim Eichard Brack- 
*ett, the jailer, may have laid down his halberd to quaff a morn- 
ing draught. 

Water Street is also self-explanatory ; it descended the incline 
to the water at Oliver's Dock. We have described elsewhere 
the primitive aspect of the region from Congress Street to the 
harbor. A British barrack was in Water Street at the time of 
the Massacre. 

At the north corner of Washington and Water Streets was 
the sign of the " Heart and Crown." It was the printing-office 
of Thomas Fleet in 1731. After his death, crowns being un- 
popular, the sign was changed to the " Bible and Heart." Fleet 
sold books, household goods, etc. In 1735 he began the pubU- 
cation of the Boston Evening Post, a successor of the Weekly 
Eehearsal, begun in 1731. Here is one of the Post's advertise- 
ments ; it would look somewhat strangely in the columns of its 
modern namesake : — 

" To be sold by the printer of this paper, the very best Negro 
Woman in this Town, who has had the Small-Pox and the measles ; 
is as hearty as a Horse, as brisk as a Bird, and will work like a 
Beaver. Aug. 23d. 1742." 

Having taken in the surroundings of the church to the north, 
we may now set our faces southward and visit in fancy the 
official residence of the royal deputies. 



THE OLD SOUTH AND PlfOAlXCE HOUSE. 



235 



The Province House was one of the last relics of the col- 
ony to disappear. It has formed the theme of some pleasant 
fictions by Hawthorne in " Twice-Told Tales," as well as a brief 
sketch of the edifice not founded in fancy. The Uquid which 
mine host mixed for the novelist before he set about his re- 
searches has a smack of reality about it, and may have enlivened 
his picturesque description. 

Tliis ancient abode of the royal governors was situated nearly 
opposite the head of Milk Street. The place is now shut out 




PROVINCE HOUSE. 



from the vision of the passer-by by a row of bric.'k stnicturos 
standing on Washington Street. Uefore tlie erection of any 
buildings to screen it from view, tlie Province .House stood 
twenty or thirty paces back from old ^Marlborough Street, with 
a Iiandsome grass lawn in front, ornamented by two stately oak- 



236 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

trees, which reared their verdant tops on either side the gate 
sej^arating the grounds from the highway, and cast a grateful 
shade over the approach to the mansion. At either end of the 
fence were porters' lodges, and the visitor passed over a paved 
walk to the building. Ample stables stood in the rear. 

The building itself was a three-story brick structure, sur- 
mounted by an octagonal cupola. Over all stood the bronze 
effigy of an Indian, — the chosen emblem of the colony. This 
figure, which served the purpose of a vane, was of hammered cop- 
per ; it had glass eyes, and appeared in the act of fitting an arrow 
to its bow. It was the handiwork of Deacon Shem Drowne. 
A flight of near twenty massive red freestone steps conducted 
to the spacious entrance-hall, worthy the vice-regal dwellers 
within. A portico supported by wooden pillars was surmounted 
by a curiously wrought iron balustrade, into which was woven 
the date of erection and initials of the proprietor, Peter Sar- 

geant : — 

16. P. S. 79. 

Prom this balcony the viceroys of the province were accus- 
tomed to harangue the people or read proclamations. The royal 
arms, richly carved and gilt, decorated the front ; the bricks 
were of Holland make. The interior was on a scale of princely 
magnificence, little corresponding to the general belief in the 
simplicity of the mode of living of the times. The homes of 
Paneuil, of Hutchinson, and of Prankland have shown that 
luxury had effected an entrance into the habitations of the rich. 
The house of Peter Sargeant was a fit companion to the others 
cited. On the first floor an ample reception-room, panelled with 
rich wood and hung with tapestry, opened from the hall. This 
was the hall of audience of Shute, Burnet, Shirley, Pownall, 
.Bernard, Gage, and, last of all. Sir William Howe. 

It is probable that the first of the governors who occupied 
the Province House was Samuel Shute, an old soldier of Marl- 
borough, who had won distinction from his king on the bloody 
fields of Flanders. His administration of the affiiirs of the 
colony, which he governed from 1 71 G to 1723, was unfortunate. 
He came into conflict with the Legislature on questions of pre- 



THE OLD SOUTH AND rROVIXCE HOUSE. 



237 






rogative. The governor, almost stripjied of liis authority, was 
obUged to seek a remedy at court, and though his powers were 
confirmed, he did not enjoy the fruits of the decision. 

It is perhaps not generally known that a paper currency of 
small denominations was issued in the colony as early as 1722. 
Specimens are here reproduced. They were printed on pardi- 
ment, of the size given in the engravings. No other instance 
is remembered of the emission of such small sums in paper 
until we come down to the 
period of the Eevolution. 
The whole amount authorized 
was only £500, and speci- 
mens are very rare. The cuts 
given here are exact fac-similes 
of the originals now in the 
possession of the Antiquarian 
Society. A very full account 
of early Massachusetts cur- 
rency may be found in the 
Proceedings of that society for 
186G, from the pen of Nathaniel Paine, Esq. In the first years 
of the settlement wampum, brass farthings, and even musket- 
bullets, supplied a circulating medium. 

AViUiam Burnet was born in 1688, at the Hague. The 
Prince of Orange, afterwards King William of England, stood 
godfather for him at the baptismal font. His fatlier was 
the celebrated Bishop Burnet, author of the " History of the 
lieformation in England." The elder Burnet, ftiUing under the 

displeasure of King James, re- 
tired to the Continent, entered 
the service of tlie Prince of 
Orange, and accomi)ariied him 
to England when AVilliam ob- 
tained the throne of his father- 
in-law, the Hying James. He 
was rewarded witli the bishop- 
ric of Salisbury, while the son 




'^"t-r^ 



tUCaSD Pence. 

]3xo^incc of 
im si)affacl)u 

fcttg.Jjne 17 22 

^: ^ ^ 



rt 



238 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



received subsequently from the House of Hanover the gov- 
ernment of New York, and afterwards that of Massachusetts 
Colony. 

The new governor was received with enthusiasm on his 
arrival. He was met at the George Tavern, on the Neck, by 
the lieutenant-governor, members of the Council, and Colonel 
Dudley's regiment. Under this escort, and followed by a vast 
concourse of gentlemen on horseback, in coaches and chaises, 
he proceeded to the Court House, where his commission was 
read. Shouts of joy and salvos of artillery from the forts and 
Castle welcomed him to Boston. Mather Byles was ready with 
a laudatory composition : — 

" While rising Shouts a general Joy proclaim, 
And ev'ry Tongue, Burnet ! lisps thy name ; 
To view thy face while crowding Armies run, 
Wliose waving Banners blaze against the Sun, 
And deep-mouth'd Cannon, with a thund'ring roar, 
Sound thy commission stretch'd from Shore to Shore. " 

Burnet lived but a short time to stem the tide of opposition 
to kingly authority, and died September 7, 1729. While he 

lived he maintained in 



proper state the dignity 
of his office. His negro 
valet, Andrew the Trum- 
peter, stood at the portal 
of the Province House, 
or drove his Excellency 
abroad in his coach. His 
menage was under the 
care of a competent house- 
keeper. Betty, the black 
laundress, had the care 
of twenty pair and one 
of Holland sheets, with 
damask napkins, and 
store of linen to match. A goodly array of plate garnished the 
sideboard, and ancient weapons graced the walls. Hobby, the 






THE OLD SOUTH AND PROVINCE HOUSE. 230 

cook, presided over the cuisine ; and coacli, cliariut, and chaises 
stood in the stables. He liad a steward and a French tutor. 

Is^otwithstanding the governor directed his funeral to take 
place in the most private manner, after the form of any Prot- 
estant church that might he nearest, the authorities would not 
have it so, and expended nearly £ 1,100 upon a yhowy pageant. 
The governor was a churchman and attended King's Chapel, 
but showed he had no religious bias in liis instructions for liis 
burial. Burnet was probably the first and last governor who 
died in the Province House. 

AVilliam Shirley was the admitted chief of the long roll of 
provincial governors. Ho lived at one 
time in King Street, but, after he became 
governor, built an elegant mansion in 
Itoxbury, afterwards occupied by Govern- 
or Eustis, and now, we believe, standing 
on Eustis Street, metamorphosed by mod- 
ern improvements. Shirley, no doubt, 
came to the Province House to transact 
official business, and. at the sitting of the General Court. In 
the reception-room was, perhaps, matured that celebrated expe- 
dition, which resulted in the capture of Louisburg. All the 
measures relating to the enterprise were conducted watli great 
ability. Profound secrecy was maintained as to its object while 
under discussion by the General Court ; the Governor carried 
the measure by only a single vote. Volunteers flocked in from 
all quarters, and the town became a camp. Over two thousand 
men were raised. Sir William Pepperell, whom an English 
historian has contemptuously called a " Piscataquay tmder," 
was given the command, and on the IGth of June, 1745, the 
bulwark of French power in America was in the hands of the 
provincial forces. 

Another measure of Governor Shirley deserves mention. Ten 
years before the passage of the Stanqi Act by the Englisli Par- 
liament, the Legislature of the colony had passed a similar act 
of their own, laying a tax on vellum, parchment, and i>uhli(; 
papers for two years; newspapers were included at first, but 




240 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 




soon exempted. This shows that it was not the stamp tax to 
which our ancestors objected, but to its levy without their con- 
sent. Specimens are here given from documents of the time to 
which the stamps were affixed. One of the cuts (the three penny 
stamp) is engraved from the original die used in the stamp-office. 
It is a short steel bar attached to the circular part, the impres- 
sion being made by a blow from a hammer. This interesting 
souvenir of the times of Shirley is in the 
possession of Jeremiah Colburn, Esq., of 
Boston, a well-known antiquarian. 

The expatriation of the unfortunate 
French from Acadia took place while 
Shirley was governor, and Massachusetts 
received about two hundred families. The 
terrific earthquake of 1755 shook the town 
to its foundations, and filled the streets with the debris of ruined 
houses, about fifteen hundred sustaining injury. Shirley was 
a man of letters, and wrote a tragedy, be- 
sides the history of the Louisburg expe- 
dition. He also held a government in 
the Bahamas, and was made lieutenant- 
general. His son, William, was killed at 
the defeat of Braddock. 

Thomas Pownall superseded Governor 
Shirley, in 1757-58, as governor. He 
occupied the chair only three years. He made a popular and 
magistrate, contrasting favorably with the 
dark, intriguing Lieutenant-Governor 
Hutchinson. The great and disastrous 
fire of March 20, 1760, occurred before 
the departure of the governor to assume 
the government of South Carolina; also 
the organization and refitting of the land 
and naval forces, under General Amherst, 
for the reduction of Quebec and Montreal. 
Governor Pownall was a stanch friend of the Colonies, even 
after hostilities commenced with the mother country. No in- 




enlightened chief 




THE OLD SOUTH AND rROVIXCE HOUSE. 241 

mate of tlie Province House was more respected or more 
rei^a'ctted. The governor made an excellent plan or picture of 
Boston from the Castle in 1757. 

Pownall, it is said, was a great ladies' man. He was rather 
short in stature, and inclined to be corpulent. It was the 
fashion of that day for a gentleman to salute a lady wlitm 
introduced to her. The governor was presented to a tall dame 
whom he requested to stoop to meet the offered courtesy. 
" No ! " says the lady, '*' I will never stoop to any man, — not 
even to your Excellency." Pownall sprang upon a chair, ex- 
claiming, " Then I will stoop to you, madam ! " and imprinted 
a loud smack upon the cheek of the haughty one. This, like 
many good old customs of our forefathers, has fallen into neg- 
lect. It was Pownall who induced the Legislature to erect a 
monument in Westminster Abbey to Lord Howe, who fell at 
Ticonderoga, and was much esteemed in Boston. Another was 
ordered to be erected to General Wolfe at the east end of the 
Town House, but Hutchinson prevented its being carried out. 

His successor, Francis Bernard, was received on his arrival 
from Xew Jersey with the usual pomp and ceremony, and 
escorted through the town to his residence at the Province 
House. During the period of Bernard's administration, from 
17G0 to 17G9, the stormy events which caused the Colonies to 
throw off the yoke of Great Britain occurred. The Writs of 
Assistance, the Stamp Act, the introduction of troops, and tlie 
removal of the General Court to Cambridge, heaped odium 
upon his conduct of affairs. Volumes have been written upon 
the history of those nine years. So Bernard passed out from 
the shelter of the Province House witli none to do liim rev- 
erence. The king recaHed him, and the provinct^ spurned liim. 
Tlie last crowned head in this colony was ])roclaim«'d by Ber- 
nard. He gave a valuable portion of his library to Harvard. 

It has been said of Bernard that he was only a facile instru- 
ment in the hands of Hutchinson. He was even cjilled Hutch- 
inson's wheelbarrow, carrying the burdens imposecl by his wily 
lieutenant. Bernard's character has been described as arbitrary ; 
he was, hoM'ever, upriglit, with correct iu-incii)les and courteous 
11 p 



242 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 




address. He built him a fine summer residence at Jamaica 
Plain, afterwards occupied by Martin Brimmer. 

After the governor's departure for England, watch and ward 
was but ill kept at the Province House, or else his Ancient 
Hutchinson, now his successor, troubled himself but little about 
the goods and chattels of the baronet. The mansion was broken 
open, and among other articles stolen were three feather-beds, 
four pair of blankets, ditto of sheets, 
all marked with his Excellency's ini- 
tials. The thief, besides this mere 
bulky booty, stole a crown-piece of 
James II. and two German rix dol- 
lars. 

The next inmate of the Province 
House was Thomas Gage, who was 
expected to support the kingly i)re- 
rogative by force of arms. We first 
found the general in quarters in 
Brattle Street, and gave there an 
outline of his career while military governor. He occupied the 
Province House when appointed to the government in 1774, 
and the tread and challenge of a British grenadier resounded 
for the first time in the ancient halls. 

Here was held the council between Earl Percy and the gov- 
ernor relative to the expedition to Lexington, so mysteriously 
noised abroad, and which Gage declared he had imparted the 
knowledge of to only one other ; even Lieutenant-Colonel 
Smith, who was intrusted with the command, did not know his 
destination. As Percy was going to his quarters from this 
interview, he met a number of townspeople conversing near the 
Common. As he went towards them, one of them remarked, 
" The British troops have marched, but will miss their aim." 
"What aim?" asked the Earl. " The cannon at Concord," was 
the answer. Percy retraced his steps to the Province House, 
where his chief heard with surprise and mortification the news 
tliat the movement was no longer a secret. He declared he had 
been betrayed. 



THE COLONY SEAL. 



THE OLD SOUTH AND niOVINCE HOUSE. 243 

The following explanation has been given of the manner in 
which CJage's i)lans were thwarted. A groom at tlie Trovince 
House dropped into the stables, then o})p()site the Old South on 
]\liUv Street, for a social chat with a stable-boy employed there. 
The news was asked of the British jockey, who, misconceiving 
tlie sentiments of his friend, replied, that he had overheard a 
conversation between Gage and other officers, and observed, 
" There will be hell to pay to-morrow." This A\as immediately 
carried to Paul lievere, Avho enjoined silence on his informant, 
and added, " You are the third person who has brouglit me the 
same information." 

It was here, too, that the perfidy of Benjamin Church was 
discovered by Deacon Davis, a visitor to the general. Before 
this tima he had been esteemed an ardent friend of tlie cause 
of liberty. His residence Avas at the south corner of Washing- 
ton and Avon Streets. 

On the morning of the 17th of June, 1775, Gage called his 
officers together to attend a coun- 
cil of war. Howe, Clinton, Bur- /ji/^ ^ /^ 
goyne, and Grant were present, //y^ . c/'^^/^^-^ 
It was an anxious consultation. Y // 
Clinton and CJrant proposed to 

land the troops at Charlestown Xeck under protection of the 
ships, and take the American works in reverse. Tliis })lan, 
which Avould have prol)al)ly resulted in the ca})ture of the wliole 
provincial force, was disa})proved by Gage, who feared to })laco 
his men, in case of disaster, between the intrenched Americans 
and reinforcements from Cambridge. General Gage returned to 
England in October, 1775. He married an American lady, and 
a niece of the general by this marriage was the wife of the late 
General William H. Sumner, of Jamaica Plain. Gage had 
served at Fontenoy and Culloden, and in I5ra(M<)ck's camjtaign. 
He is said to have l)orne an extraordinary jnTsonal resemblance 
to Samuel Adams, the chief conspimtor against liis sway, but 
few can fail to mark in the portrait of the general tlie absence 
of that firmness and decision which is so conspicuous in that 
of the patriot. 



244 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Gage's well-known proclamation was thus humorously hit 

off soon after its appearance : — 

''Tom Gage's Proclamation, 
Or blustering Denunciation, 
(Replete witli Defamation, 
And speedy Jugiilation, 
Of the New England Nation), 
Who shall his pious ways shun, 

" Tl)us graciously the war I wage. 
As witnesseth my hand — 

Tom Gage." 

Sir William Howe, as Gage's military successor, took up his 
quarters at the Province House, and occupied it during the 
winter of 1 775 - 76. As the siege had now begun, its position 
was central and well adapted for communication with the 
works at the Neck, or at Copp's Hill, from which it was about 
equally distant. The " Governour's House " now presented a 
busy scene, and so indeed did the neighborhood. The dragoons 
held possession of the Old South. The orderlies' horses stood 
hitched in front of the general's quarters, and armed heel and 
sabre clattered up and down the broad staircase, bringing re- 
ports from the various outposts. 

Howe was a good soldier, but not an enterprising one. He had 
fought with Wolfe at Quebec as lieutenant-colonel, receiving 
the grade of major-general in 1772. During the siege he coolly 
gave the order to occupy or pull down churches or dwellings as 
necessity dictated. He has been much execrated for setting 
fire to Charlestown, but the fire kept up from some of the 
houses justified the act in a military view. Finally Howe 
effected the withdrawal of his army without loss from Boston, 
by making the safety of the town a guaranty of his own. His 
after career in America Avas measurably successful; defeating 
Washington at Long Island and White Plains, he took posses- 
^ sion of New York, while the battles of Brandywine and Ger- 
mantown gave him Philadelphia. He was relieved by his old 
comrade Sir H. Clinton, and returned home in 1778, when an 
official inquiry was made into his conduct. Howe's address 
to his troops before the battle of Bunker Hill is a soldierly 
document. 



THE OLD SOUTH AND PROVINCE HOUSE. 245 

" Gentlemen, — I am very happy in having the honor of com- 
manding so tine a body of men ; I do not in the least doubt that 
you will behave like Englishmen, and as becometh good soldiers. 

" If the enemy will not come from their intrenchments, we must 
drive them out, at all events, otherwise the town of Boston will be 
set on lire by them. 

" I shall not desire one of you to go a step further than where I 
go myself at your head. 

" Eemember, gentlemen, we have no recourse to any rescnirces if 
we lose Boston, but to go on board oiu" ships, which will Ije very 
disagreeable to us all." 

There is every reason to believe Sir William's military duties 
(lid not prevent his exercising a generous hospitality. The hall 
of audience * has no doubt resounded with mirth and music 
when the general received. There were his royalist neighbors, 
the ]\rascarenes, Harrison Gray, the Boutineaus and ^Master 
Lovell, with many kindred spirits of the court party. There 
were Clinton, Burgoyne, the noble Percy, and many more of 
the army and navy to grace the levees of their commander by 
their presence. The buzz of conversation ceases as Sir William 
leads out some beautiful tory for the stately minuet, an ex- 
ample speedily followed by his guests. Perhaps amid the 
strains of the Fusileer's band strikes in the deep diapason of 
the continental cannon. 

The coming of the troops into Boston made formidable 
innovations in the customs and dress of the old founders. 
The sad-colored garments and high-crowned hats gave jdace to 
velvet coat, rufftes, and cocked hat. Gentlemen of condition 
wore the small sword in full dress, with a gold-headed c^nie to 
set off the lace depending from their sleeves. A gentleman's 
ball dress was a white coat, trimmed with silver basket but- 
tons, collar and button-holes crossed Avitli silver lace. Or, a 
coat of blue or scarlet cloth trimmed witli gold might serve a 
gallant of the period. His hair was crajx'd and jjowdcrcd. A 
satin embroidered waistcoat reaching below tlie liips, witli small 
clothes o^ the same material, gold or silver knee-bands, wliito 
silk stockings, and high-heeled morocco shoes, witli l)uckles of 
some precious metal, completed a truly elegant attire. 



246 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

The ladies wore a sacque with a long trail petticoat hand- 
somely trimmed. Satin shoes with paste or metal buckle con- 
fined delicate feet. The hair was craped and ornamented 
according to fancy, and profusely sprinkled with white powder. 
The gown was set off to advantage by two or three tiers of 
ruffles. Such was court dress, and court etiquette prevailed. 
The manners were distinguished for stiffness and formality, 
relaxing a little under the influence of the ballroom. The 
last queen's ball was held February 22, 1775. 

Our reader will care little to know who originally owned the 
ground whereon stood the Province House. Peter Sargeant 
built it in the year 1679, and the Provincial Legislature became 
its purchaser in 1716. After the lie volution it was occupied 
by the Treasurer and other officers of the Commonwealth. 
When the building was reconstructed in 1851, old copper coins 
of the reign of the Georges, and some even of as old date as 
1612, were taken from the floors and ceilings, where they had 
lain 'perdu since dropped by a careless functionary, or perhaps 
from the breeches pocket of my Lord Howe. Ancient-look- 
ing bottles of Holland make were found too, suggestive of 
Schnapps and Dutch courage. Burnet perchance may have 
inherited the weakness with his Dutch blood. 

After the adoption of the State Constitution it became a 
" Government House." The easterly half was occupied by the 
Governor and Council, Secretary of State and Peceiver-General. 
The other half was the dwelling of the Treasurer. The State 
was inclined to keep up the character of the Province House 
by making it the governor's official residence, and voted sums 
of money for the purpose. In 1796 the Commonwealth, being 
then engaged in building the present State House, sold the Pro- 
vince House to John Peck, but it reverted back to the State in 
1799, Peck being unable to fulfil his part of the contract. 

Governor Caleb Strong occupied it after his election in 1800. 
He had been active in promoting the cause of the Revolution, 
and took part in all the prominent measures of organization of 
the body politic at its end. He was in tlie United States 
Senate in 1789-97. In 1812 he was again elected governor. 



THE OLD SOUTH AND PROVINCE HOUSE. 247 

Being a strong Federalist, lie refused to answer the calls made 
upon him for troops by the general government, but took 
measures to protect the State from invasion. The old revolu- 
tionary works at South Boston were strengthened and manned, 
and a new one erected on Noddle's Island in 1814, which bore 
the governor's name. This conflict between State and Federal 
authority forms a curious chapter in the political history of 
the times. 

Governor Strong is described as a tall man, of moderate ful- 
ness ; of rather long visage, dark comjilexion, and blue eyes. 
He wore his hair loose combed over his forehead, and slightly 
powdered. He had nothing of the polish of cities in his de- 
meanor, but a gentle complaisance and kindness. 

In 1811 the Massachusetts General* Hospital was incorpo- 
rated and endowed by the State with the Province House. 
The trustees of the institution leased the estate, in 1817, to 
David Greenough for ninety-nine years, who, erecting the 
stores in its front, converted it to the uses of trade. It be- 
came a tavern, a hall of negro minstrelsy, and was finally 
destroyed by tire in October, 1864. 

Some relics of this venerable and historic structure remain. 
The Indian came into the possession of Henry Greenough, Fsq., 
of Cambridge, and was permitted to remain some time in the 
hands of the late Dr. J. C. Warren, of Park Street, but at his 
decease no traces of it could be discovered, much to the regret 
of its owner. Perhaps it is still in existence. The royal arms 
are in the possession of the Historical Society. Colonel Ben- 
jamin Perley Poore became the possessor of much of the cedar 
wainscot and of the porch. Tlie panelling he has devoted to 
the finish of a pre-Ilevolutionary suite of rooms, wliile tlie j)(irch 
forms the entrance to his garden at Indian Hill, West Newbury. 

The grand staircase down which Hawthorne's gliostly pro- 
cession descended led to apartments devoted to domestic uses. 
The massive oaken timbers Avere memorials of the stanch and 
solid traits of the builders. Here Shute brooded and fumed; 
here Burnet wrote and Bernard plotted ; and here (Jage and 
Howe planned and schemed in vain. All have jtassed away. 



248 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

The Blue Bell and Indian Queen tavern stood on eacli side 
of a passage formerly leading from Washington Street to Haw- 
ley. Nathaniel Bishop kept it in 1673, which entitles it to be 
ranked with the old ordinaries. The officers from the Province 
House and Old South often dropped in to take their cognac 
neat. The landlady, at this time, a stanch whig, had the re- 
pute of an amazon. Some officers one day, exciting her ire by 
calling for brandy under the name of " Yankee blood," she 
seized a spit and drove them from her house. Zadock Pomeroy 
kept the inn in 1800. About 1820 the Washington Coffee 
House was erected in place of the Indian Queen, but it, too, 
has vanished. It will be remembered as the starting-place of 
the old Eoxbury Hourlies. No. 158 indicates the site, corre- 
sponding with the Parker Block. 

Another Indian Queen was in Bromfield's Lane, since Street. 
Isaac Trask kept it, and after him Nabby, his widow, until 
1816. Simeon Boyden was next proprietor; Preston Shepard 
in 1823, afterwards of the Pearl Street House ; and W. Mun- 
roe. This was the late Bromfield House, now occupied by a 
handsome granite block styled the Wesleyan Association Build- 
ing. It was a great centre for stages while they continued to 
run. The likeness of an Indian princess gave the name to old 
and new tavern. 

The Bromfield House site becomes important as the birth- 
place ■ of Thomas Gushing, lieutenant-governor under Hancock 
and Bowdoin, friend and coworker in the patriot cause with 
Adams, Otis, and Warren. The British Ministry ascribed great 
influence to Gushing. He was member both of the Provincial 
and Continental Congresses, and commissary-general in 1775. 
Governor Gushing was a member of the Old South. He died 
in 1788, and was buried in the Granary Burying Ground. 

A few paces from the site of the old Indian Queen, or, ac- 
cording to the present landmarks, 166 Washington Street, was 
the abode of the gifted Josiah Quincy, Jr., and the birthplace 
of his son, Josiah, who is best known to Boston as the greatest 
of "her chief magistrates. Uriah Cotting, Charles Bulfinch, and 
Josiah Quincy are the triumvirate who, by waving their magi- 



THE OLD SOUTH AND TROVINXE HOUSE. 249 

cian's wand, changed Boston from a straggling provincial town 
into a metropolis. 

Josiali Quincy, Jr., died at the early age of thirty-one, while 
returning from a voyage to England, undertaken partly for the 
benefit of his health. He was constitutionally delicate, and his 
mental strength far exceeded his physical. He was chosen, with 
John Adams, by Captain Preston, to defend him on his trial 
for the Massacre in King Street, and did defend him Avith all 
his abihty, notwithstanding his own father warmly opposed his 
undertaking it. Mr. Quincy was possessed of high oratorical 
powers. The phlegmatic John Adams named him the Boston 
Cicero ; his pohtical writings, begun in the Boston Gazette of 
October, 17G7, are full of hre and patriotic fervor. AVhen in 
England he was, with Franklin, singled out for a brutal allusion 
by Lord Hillsborough, who declared they " ought to be in 
Kewgate or at Tyburn." His strength proved unequal to the 
voyage, and he breathed his last within sight of his native land 
only a few days after the battle of Lexington. 

" Ask ye wliat thoughts 
Convulsed liis soul, when his dear native shores, 
Thronged Avith the imagery of lost delight, 
Gleamed on his darkening eye, while the hoarse wave 
Uttered his death dirge, and no hand of love 
Might yield its tender trembling ministry ? " 

Josiah Quincy, Jr. is said to have been the first Boston 
lawyer who put up a sign-board over his door. 

Josiali Quincy succeeded Mr. Phillips as mayor in 1823, over 
his competitor Otis. AVe have paid a tribute to his forecast and 
enterprise abeady. To him is due the establishment of Houses 
of Industry and Eeformation. Commercial Street completed 
his transformation of the T( wn Dock region. Tender him the 
Fire Department was founded in 1827. After a long and useful 
public service in city. State, and national councils, Mr. C^hiincy 
took the presidency of Harvard University in 1829, wlicrc he 
continued in office until 1845. 

At the annual festival of the pul)lic schools of Boston in 
Faneuil Hall, August, 1826, and on completion of the granite 
market-house, Judge Story, being present, volunteered the fol- 
. 11* 



250 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

lowing sentiment, — " May the fame of our honored mayor 
prove as diinible as the material of which the beautiful market- 
house is constructed." On which, quick as light, the mayor 
responded, ^' That stupendous monument of the wisdom of our 
forefathers, the Supreme Court of the United States ; in the 
event of a vacancy, may it be raised one story higher." "'^ This 
pun has also been attributed to Edward Everett. 

Benjamin Hichborn, another Revolutionary patriot, next oc- 
cupied the premises made vacant by the Quincys. He was a 
graduate of Harvard, and an eminent member of the Suffolk 
bar. For his zeal in his country's cause he was imprisoned on 
board a British vessel, the Preston, lying in Boston harbor. 
Mr. Hichborn was a Jefiersonian Democrat. He was colonel 
of the Cadets in 1778, and marched at their head into liliode 
Island. In the year following he had the misfortune to be 
connected with an unfortunate accident which caused the death 
of his friend, Benjamin Andrews. The gentlemen were exam- 
ining some pistols, Mrs. Andrews being present. One of the 
weapons, incautiously handled, was discharged, taking effect in 
^Ir. Andrews's head, causing death in a few minutes. 

* Quincy's Life. 



FKOM THE OLD SOUTH liOUND FOKT HILL. 251 



CHAPTER IX. 

FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 

Birthplace of Franklin. — James Boutineau. — Bowdoin Block. — Hawley 
Street. — Devonshire and Franklin Streets. — Joseph Barrell. — The Ton- 
tine. — Boston Library. — Cathedral of the Holy Cross. — Bishop Cheve- 
rus. — Federal Street Theatre. — Some Account of Early Theatricals in 
Boston. — Kean, Finn, Macready, etc. — John Howard Paine. — Fuileral 
Street Church. — The Federal Convention. — Madam Scott. — Robert 
Treat Paine. — Thomas Paine. — Congress Street. — Quaker Church and 
Burying-Ground. — Sketch of the Society of Friends in Boston. — Mer- 
chants' Hall. — Governor Sliirley's Funeral. — Fire of 1760. — Pearl Street. 
— The Ropewalks. — The Grays. — ConHicts between the Rope-Makers 
and the Regulars. — Pearl Street House. — Spurzheim. — Washington Alls- 
ton. — Theophilus Parsons. — T. H. Perkins. — Governor Oliver. — Quincy 
Mansion, — Governor Gore. — Liverpool Wharf. — Tea Party and Licidents 
of. — The Sconce. — Governor Andi'os Deposed. — Sun Tavern. — Fort 
Hill. 

WE enter on Milk Street, the ancient Fort Street, con- 
ducting from the governor's house to tlie Sconce, or 
South Battery, — a route we now propose to follow. 

Before we come to Hawley Street we see a granite edifice 
with "Birthplace of Franklin" standing out in boM rcHcf 
from the pediment. No new light has been shed u\nm tliis 
interesting question since we left the Bhie Ball. It is enough 
that we honor the philosopher's name in many i)ul)lic places, — 
no locality may claim him. Apropos of Franklin, wlien lio 
was at the court of his most Christian ^Majesty, he soon became 
the rage, not only of court circles, but of the capital. Presents 
flowed in upon him, which he, with ready tact, contnv«'d to 
share with his fellow-commissioners, so as to avoid the ai)pear- 
ance of invidious distinction. Among other things, there ciime 
to his lodgings a superb gift of fruits, labelled " Lo digne Frank- 
lin." "This time," said Silas Deane, " you cannot jiretenil this 
is not for you alone." " Not so," said Franklin ; " the Fivnch- 



252 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



men cannot master our American names ; it is, plainly, Lee, 

Deane, Franklin, that is meant." 

Arthur Lee, Franklin's fellow-commissioner, composed eight 

lines of the famous Liberty 
Song of John Dickinson, 
which the latter sent James 
Otis, uj)on news that the 
Legislature of IMassachu- 
setts refused to rescind the 
resolve to send a circular 
letter calling a convention 
of the sister colonies to 
oppose taxation without 
representation. It was 
printed in the Pennsyl- 
vania Chronicle, July 4, 
1768, and is the earliest 
of the Eevolutionary lyrics 
that boldly speaks of in- 




FRANKLIN R BIRTHPLACE. 



dependence and union. 

" Tlien join hand in hand, brave Americans all ; 
By uniting we stand, by dividing we fall ; 
In so righteous a cause let us hope to succeed, 
For Heaven approves of eacli generous deed. 

Our purses are ready, — 

Steady, friends, steady, — 

Not as slaves, but as freemen, our money we'll give." 

The old house here represented is a quaint specimen of the 
old order of buildings. It was burnt December 29, 1810, 
shortly after a drawing had been secured. Old Josiah Frank- 
lin, the father of Benjamin, was a native of England, and by 
trade a silk-dyer ; he became a respectable soap-boiler and 
tallow-chandler in Boston. Benjamin was born on the 6th 
of January, 1706, and is upon the church records as having 
received baptism the same day. Upon this is founded the 
claim of the old house to be the place of his nativity. The 
sign of the statue of Faust, displayed by the present occupants 
of the Birthplace of Franklin, is the same used by Thomas 



FKOM THE OLD SOUTH EOUND FORT HILL. 2a'3 

and Andrews in years gone by at tlie old stand in Xewlniiy 
Street. 

Opposite to us, and just below, is tlie " Old South Block," 
built upon the site of the parsonage in 1845. Next below 
is Sewall Block, which covers the site of the mansion of James 
Boutineau, a royalist, who departed from Boston in the train 
of Howe. Boutineau married Peter Faneuil's sister, Susannah, 
and was, like Faneuil, descended from the French Huguenots. 
He was a lawyer and managed the case of his son-indaw, Kob- 
inson, — the same who assaulted James Otis ; his house, a brick 
mansion, stood a little removed from the street, with the usual 
flagged walk, shaded by trees, leading up to it. 

" Bowdoin Block " has a noteworthy record. It stands at 
the east corner of Hawley Street, once known as Bishop's Alley, 
probably from Bishop of the Blue Bell, and also as Boarded 
Alley, — from its having been boarded over at one time, — a 
name our readers Avill see reproduced in a lane leading from 
Hanover Street to North. On the corner of the alley, Seth 
Adams once carried on printing ; his son was the first post- 
rider to Hartford, and rode hard to carry the post in four days. 
In this same Boarded Alley was established the first theatre in 
Boston, of which more hereafter. 

Morton Place was named at the request of Thomas Kilby 
Jones, whose wife was a IMorton, and not for Governor jNIorton, 
as has been supposed. It was here Payne, father of John How- 
ard, kept a school, before Morton Place was constructed. 

On the site of Bowdoin Block was another old-tinu> mansion, 
which belonged at one time to James Bowdoin, son of the 
governor, minister to ^ladrid in 1808. He was once a merchant 
in State Street, occupying a row of three stores with John 
Coffin Jones and Thomas Ptussell. He was a man of highly 
cultivated intellectual tastes, but of slender habit. Ho filled 
many offices within the State before his appointment to the 
court of Madrid. James Bowdoin was a munificent patron of 
Bowdoin College, to which he gave lantls, money, and his valu- 
able library and philosophical apparatus collected abroa<l. His 
widow, also his cousin, married General Henry Dearborn, and 



254 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

both resided there until their decease. This house was also the 
birthplace of the Hon. E. C. Winthrop ; it became afterwards 
a hotel called the Mansion House. 

Devonshire Street has swallowed up the old Theatre Alley, 
which conducted by a narrow and by no means straight way 
to Franklin Street, by the rear of the old Boston Theatre, — 
hence its name. Besides Pudding Lane, a name borrowed from 
old London, Devonshire Street, meaning that part lying north 
of Milk Street, has been known as Jollitfe's Lane. AVhere the 
new Post-Office is was once an old inn called the Stackpole 
House, first the mansion of William Stackpole, and afterwards 
kept as a tavern by Pouillard of the Julien. It was a large 
brick building, — end to the street with court-yard in front. 

Previous to the year 1792 all the lower part of Franklin 
Street was a quagmire. No greater change has taken place 
in 'Boston than the conversion of this swamp into useful, solid 
ground. Joseph Barrell, Esq., whose estate was on Summer 
Street, first drained the slough for a garden, in which he had 
built a fish-pond, amply stocked with gold-fish. Where the 
old Boston Theatre stood was a large distillery, and behind it 
a pasture extending between Summer and Milk Streets as far 
as Hawley Street. 

This Joseph Barrell, Avhose handsome grounds and mansion 
became afterwards the property of Benjamin Bussey, was a 
pioneer in the northwest coast trade, which opened such a 
magnificent field to American commerce. He with others 
fitted out the first Boston vessels which doubled Cape Horn. 
They were the Columbia, Captain Kendrick, and Washington, 
Captain Gray. The captains exchanged vessels at sea, and the 
Cohnnbia's was the first keel that passed the bar of the great 
river, which now bears the name of Captain Gray's vessel, the 
Columbia. 

The improvement was carried out by Charles Bulfinch, Wil- 
liam Scollay, and Charles Yaughan. The Legislature refused 
to incorporate the projectors on the Tontine plan, but the im- 
provement was afterwards carried successfully through, with 
some modification. A block of sixteen handsome buildings, 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 255 

designed for dwellings, was erected in 1793, and culled the 
'' Crescent," or " Tontine." It has been mentioned that this 
was the first block of buildings erected in Ijoston. The name 
" Tontine " signified an association for building purposes on the 
annuity plan, as practised in Europe. A large arch penetrated 
the block, flanked by buildings on either side, standing a little 
in advance of the rest ; these were ornamented with i)ilasters 
and balustrade. The opposite side of the street was called 
Franklin Place. In the middle of the street was an enclosed 
grass-plot tliree hundred feet long, containing a monumental 
urn to the memory of Franklin, then recently deceased. This 
central strip, oval in form, has, like the Tontine-Crescent, passed 
from view ; the original conveyance prohibits the erection of 
buildings upon it. 

The rooms over the arch were occupied by the Historical 
Society and by the Boston Library. This latter was incor- 
porated in 1794, and was designed to be somewhat more pop- 
ular in its character than either the Athenjeum or Historical 
Society. It grew steadily in public favor, and by the revereion 
of its shares to the corporation at the death of the shareholder 
a handsome fund was in time obtained. The Library sold its 
property, M'hich rested upon no foundation, — the arch ex- 
cepted, — and removed first to Essex Street, and finally to the 
building remodelled for them in Boylston Place. These peculiar 
tenures of houses without land are uncommon in this country, 
but are said to be quite usual in Scotland, where s('])aratt! 
stages or flats of the same building are owned by dillrri'ut 
proprietors. 

Looking south across Franklin Street, we see a noble jtilc 
with the name of Cathedral Buildings on its lofty front. This 
is, or was, consecrated ground, and supported the weiglit 
of the Church of the Holy Cross, until traflic swept it from 
the street. A brief notice of the origin of the Bomish wor- 
ship in Boston has been given. This church was erectctl, in 
1803, by the efforts of Bev. Father Matignon, who came to 
Boston in 1792, and of John Cheverus, afterwards Bishop of 
the diocese, — since of Montauban, France, — who followed him 



256 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

in 1796. The Protestants generously contributed to build an 
edifice their fathers would not have for a moment tolerated. It 
was consecrated by Bishop Carroll of Baltimore when completed. 
The greatly enhanced vahie of the ground led to its demoli- 
tion some years ago ; a massive and lofty temple is now rearing 
its huge bulk on the Neck, mainly founded on the price of the 
Franklin Street Catliedral. Beside the church, the Catholics 
erected a building which was used as a convent of Ursulines. 
Boston was constituted into a see in 1810 which included all 
the New England States. A curious parallel might be drawn 
in the occupation of the house of the French Huguenots, who 
fled from Catholic persecution, by a congregation of that faith. 

Bishop Cheverus, afterwards a Cardinal, was sincerely be- 
loved in Boston by Protestants and Catholics alike. Otis and 
Quincy were his friends. He took a deep interest in the heated 
controversy that ensued over the treaty negotiated with Great 
Britain by Washington, known as Jay's Treaty. 

On this question Harrison Gray Otis came before the people 
of Boston for the first time in a public speech, and the good 
Bishop was so charmed with the brilliant oratory of the speaker, 
that he threw his arms around Mr. Otis, and exclaimed, while 
the tears ran down his fiace, " Future generations, young man, 
will rise up and call thee blessed." 

The Federal Street was the first regular theatre established 
in Boston. It was opened February 3, 1794, with the tragedy 
of Gustavus Vasa. Thomas Paine, the same who afterwards 
changed his name to Eobert Treat, because he wanted a Chris- 
tian name, wrote the prologue, having been adjudged the prize 
against a number of competitors. Charles Stuart Powell was 
the first manager. The theatre was also called the Old Drury, 
after Drury Lane, London. In 1798, while under the manage- 
ment of Barrett and Harper, the house was destroyed by fire, 
leaving only the brick walls standing. The theatre was soon 
rebuilt and opened in October, 1798, under the management 
of Mr. Hodgkinson, with "Wives as they Were." Mr. George 
L. Barrett conducted the next season, and in the following 
year, 1800, the celebrated Mrs. Jones appeared. Mr. Dickson 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH HOUND FOKT HILL. 



257 



was a favorite actor at this house until his retirement from the 
stage in 1817. In this year the managers were Powell, Dick- 
son, and Duff, and under their auspices Edmund Kean iirst 
performed in Boston. He met with a favorable reception, and 




BOSTON TIIEATKE AND FRANKLIN STREET. 

departed with a full purse and high opinion of Boston, which 
he pronounced " the Literary Emporium of the AVestern 
World." 

In 1825 Kean renewed his visit to America, but the Bos- 
tonians, offended at his supercilious conduct on the occasion of 
his second engagement, when he refused to play to a thin 
house, would not allow him to utter a word, and he was finally 
driven from the stage by a shower of projectiles. Henry J. 
Einn, then one of the managers, vainly endeavored to obtain a 
hearing for the tragedian, who stood before the audiiMice in the 
most submissive attitude, while his countenance was a picture 
of rage and humiliation. A riotous crowd from tlio outside 
forced their way into the house and destroyed wliat tliey ccnild 
of the interior. The discomfited Kean sought safety in lliglit. 

Finn was one of the best eccentric comedians Boston has 
ever kno^^Tl. Besides being an actor, he was a clever minia- 
ture painter. He first appeared at tlie Boston Theatre OetobtT 
22, 1822, and perished in the ill-fated Lexington lost in Long 

Q 



258 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Island Sound, January 13, 1840. Finn usually announced liis 
benefits with some witty morcecm like this : — 

*' Like a grate full of coals I bum, 
A great full house to see ; 
And if I prove not grateful too, 
A great fool I shall be. " 

Kean, notwithstanding his fiasco in Boston, was possessed 
of generous impulses, of which many anecdotes are related in 
illustration. The scene on the night of his retirement from 
the stage, when he appeared as Othello, at Covent Garden, as- 
sisted by his son Charles as lago, is an ever-memorable event 
in the annals of the stage. Broken down by emotion and 
physical infirmity, the actor had to be borne from the theatre by 
his son to a neighboring house. He survived but a few weeks. 

Edmund Kean was noted for the abuse of his powers by in- 
dulgence in the social glass. He had a weakness to be thought 
a classical scholar, and would quote scraps of Latin connnon- 
places. One evening, while deep in a nocturnal orgie, his secre- 
tary, E. Phillips, tired of waiting for him, sent a servant to 
report the situation at two in the morning. 

Pliilli])s, What 's Mr. Kean doing now 1 

Waiter. Making a speech about Shakespeare. 

Phillips. He 's getting drunk, you had better order the carriage. 

(Half past two.) 

PhillilJS. What 's he at now ? 

Waiter. He's talking Latin, sir. 
Phillips. Then he is drunk. I must get him away. 

Mrs. Susanna Rowson, the gifted authoress of " Charlotte 
Temple," appeared at the Federal Street Theatre in September, 
1796. In March of the year following her play of " Americans 
in England " was brought out at this house, and received with 
great favor. Mrs. Rowson soon sought a more congenial em- 
ployment, opening in the early part of 1797 a school for young 
ladies in Federal Street with a single pupil. Her facile pen 
was equally ready in prose or verse, the latter covering a wide 
range from deep pathos to stirring martial odes. 

Mrs. Rowson's remarkable force of character enabled her to 



FROM THE OLD SOmi EOUND FOllT HILL. 259 

rise superior to the deep-seated prejudice against novel-writers 
and actresses, — she was botli, — and to connnand not only the 
respect, but the patronage at last of many who would have 
looked upon an association with her at one time as contaminating. 

Macready made his first appearance before a Boston audience 
at this theatre in the character of Yirginius ; and Boston was 
also his place of refuge after the lamentable Astor Place liiot, 
in XeAv York. John Howard Payne also acted here. About 
1833 the house was closed as a theatre, and leased to the 
society of Free Inquirers. In 1834 the " Academy of Music," 
an institution for the culture of vocal and iiistrumental nnisic, 
obtained possession. ]\Ir. Lowell Mason conducted the Acad- 
emy, and the name of the theatre was now changed to the 
" Odeon." Eeligious services were held on Sundays by Pev. 
AVilliam M. Rogers's society until the building of their church 
on Winter Street. The stage was again cleareil for theatrical 
performances in 184G-47, under a lease to Mr. C. P. Tliorne. 
Lafayette visited the Boston Theatre on the last evening of 
his stay in 1*824. An entire new front was erected on Federal 
Street in 182G, and an elegant saloon added with many interior 
improvements. About 1852 the theatre property was soM, and 
the present business structure erected on its site at the north- 
east corner of Franklin and Federal Streets. 

Charles Bultinch was the architect of the Boston Theatre. 
It was built of luick, was one hundred and forty feet long, 
sixty-one feet wide, and forty feet high. An arcadt^ projccttMl 
from the front, serving as a carriage entrance. The house had 
the appearance of two stories ; both the upper and hnver were 
arched, with square windows, those of the second stage being 
the most lofty. Corinthian pilasters and columns decorated 
front and rear. Several independent outlets afforded ready 
egress. The main entrance was in front, wliere, aligliting under 
cover from their carriages, the company pjissed tlirough an open 
saloon to two staircases leading to corriilors at the back of the 
boxes. The pit and gallery were entered from the sides. 

The interior was circular in form, the ceiling being composed 
of elliptic arches resting on Corinthian columns. There were 



260 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

two rows of boxes, the second suspended hj invisible means. 
The stage was flanked by two columns, and across the opening 
were thrown a cornice and balustrade ; over this were j^'Wnted 
the arms of the United States and of Massachusetts, blended 
with histrionic emblems. From the arms depended the motto, 
"All the World 's a Stage." The walls were painted azure, and 
the colmnns, front of the boxes, etc., straw and lilac color ; the 
balustrades, mouldings, etc., were gilt, and the second tier of 
boxes were hung with crimson silk. There was also a beautiful 
and spacious ballroom at the east end, handsomely decorated, 
with small retiring-rooms. A cuisine, Avell furnished, was be- 
neath. Such was the first play-house Boston ever had. 
Cast on the opening night of the Boston Theatre : — 

NEW THEATRE 

Will open on Monday next, February 3d, 

With the truly Republican Tragedy, 

GUSTAVTJS VASA, 

THE DELIVERER OF HIS COUNTRY. 

All the characters (being the first time they were ever performed by the present 
company) will be personated by Messrs. Baker, Jones, Collins, Nel- 
son, Bartlett, Powell, S. Powell, and Kenny ; Miss Harrison, 
Mrs. Jones, Mi's. Baker, and the Child by Miss Cor- 
nelia Powell, being her first appearance on 
any Stage. To which will be added 
an Ente^'tainment called 

MODERN ANTIQUES ; 
or, 

THE MERRY MOURNERS. 

Mr. and Mrs. Cockletop by Mr. Jones and IMiss Baker. The other characters 
by Messrs. S. Powell, Collins, Nelson, Baker, etc., Mrs. 

Jones, Mrs. Baker, and Mrs. Collins. 

» 

The history of the Boston stage is instructive, as showing the 
gradual development of a change of feeling in regard to the 
establishment of theatres. The earliest attempt at such exhi- 
bitions was a performance at the British Coffee House of 
Otway's Orphan, in 1750, followed by a law forbidding them 
under severe penalties. The British officers had their theatre, 
in 1775, in Faneuil Hall, where they produced the "Blockade 
of Boston," by General Burgoyne, " Zara," and other pieces. 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH ItOUXD FORT HILL. 2G1 

In 1792 a company of comedians from London, chief um»)n<; 
wliom Avas Charles Powell, fitted ujj a stable in Loard AHey 
(Hawley Street) into a theatre. Governor Hancock was highly 
incensed at this infraction of the laws, and made it the suhject 
of special comment in his message to the Legislature. The 
representations Avere conducted under the name of " Moral 
Lectm-es," but were brought to a summary conclusion Ijy the 
appearance of Sheriff Allen on the stage, who arrested one of 
the performers as he stood in the guise of the Crooked Back 
Tyrant. The audience sympathized with the actors, and amid 
great excitement, in wliich Hancock's portrait was torn from 
the stage-box and trampled under foot, the play ingloriously 
ended. The law, however, was repealed, before the year Avas 
out, maiidy tlu'ough the efforts of John Gardiner, while Samuel 
Adams and H. G. Otis opposed its abrogation. Mr. Otis, how- 
ever, defended the captured knight of the buskin, and procured 
his discharge on technical grounds. 

Eill at the opening in Board Alley : — 

NEW EXHIBITION ROOM. 

Board Alley. 

FEATS OF ACTIVITY. 

This Evening, the 10th of August, will be exliibited Dancing on the Tight 

Rope by Monsieurs Placide and INIartiu. Mons. Placide will 

dance a Hornpipe on a Tiglit Rope, play the Violin 

in various attitudes, and jump over a 

cane backwards and forwaids. 

INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS, 
By Mr. Harper. 

SINGING, 

By ]\Ir. Wools. 

Various feats of tumbling by Mons. Placide and IMartin, who will make 

somersetts liackwards over a talde, chair, &c. 

IMons. Martin will exhibit several feats on the Slack Rope. 

In the course of the Evening's Entertainments will be delivered 

THE GALLERY OF PORTRAITS, 

or, 

THE WORLD AS IT GOES, 

By Mr. Harjier. 

Tlie whole to conclude with a Dancing Ballet oallod The Bird Catcher, with the 

Minuet de la Cour and the Gavot. 



262 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

John Howard Payne, whose memory is immortalized by 
" Home, Sweet Home," lived in a little old wooden building 
at the corner of Channing, formerly Berry and Sister Streets. 
His father, at one time, kept a school in his dM^elHng, which he 
styled the Berry Street Academy. Howard showed an early 
inclination for theatricals, and was the leader of an amateur 
company composed of his young companions. He was also 
possessed of a martial spirit, and organized a band of juvenile 
soldiers of his own age, with whom he paraded the streets, 
armed with muskets borrowed of Wallach, the Essex Street 
Jew. On one occasion, when drawn up on the Common, they 
were invited into the line and passed in review by General 
Elliott. The company was called the Federal Band, and their 
uniform, blue and white, was copied from the Boston Light 
Infentry. Payne was sent to Union College, Schenectady, 
through the generosity of a noble-minded New-Yorker. His 
father's death occurring while he was at college, he resolved 
to try the stage, and made his first appearance at the Park 
Theatre in February, 1809, as Young Norval. He astonished 
everybody, and went the round of American theatres with 
great success. He went to England in 1813, suffering a brief 
imprisonment at Liverpool as an American alien. After a time 
he went to Paris, and devoted himself to adapting successful 
French plays for the London stage. He witnessed the return 
of Bonaparte from Elba, and the scenes of the " Hundred 
Days." His future life was one of trial, vicissitude, and unre- 
quited effort. The plays of *' Therese," and " Clari, the Maid 
of Milan," are from his pen. " Home, Sweet Home," was first 
sung by Miss Tree, sister of Mrs. Charles Kean, and procured 
her a wealthy husband, and filled the treasury of Covent Gar- 
den. Payne afterwards received an appointment from our gov- 
ernment as consul at Tunis. He died in 1852. Who knows 
that " Sweet Home " was not the plaint of his own heart, sigh- 
ing for the scenes of his youth 1 

"An exile from home, pleasure dazzles in vain, 
All, give me my lowly thatched cottage again ; 
The birds singing sweetly that came to my call, — 
Give me them, and that peace of mind dearer than all," 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH HOUND FOKT HILL. 



2G3 



Another al)aiuloned church-site is near. The Oh I Prcshyto- 
rian Meeting-lioiise stood on the iu)rth corner of Fc(U'ral and 
Berry Streets. The hitter lias changed its name to Channing, 
as it did its ancient orthography, 
Bury into Berry. The fountk'rs 
of this church were Irish Pres- 
byterians, and tlieir first liouse 
of worsliip was a barn, which 
sufficed until they were able, in 
1744, to build a neat wooden 
edifice. Governor Hancock pre- 
sented the bell and vane which 
had belonged to the Old Brattle 
Street Meeting-house. The old 
house was a pattern of many that 
may still be seen in our older 
'New England villaj^jes. 




An amusing incident is related 



OLD FEDERAL STREET CUURCH. 



of the vane, — Hancock's gift. Colonel Erving, meeting Rev. 
John Moorhead, directed his attention to the fact that the 
vane did not move, but remained fixed in its position. " Ay, 
I must see to it," said the honest parson, who ran immediately 
to the mechanic who placed the vane on the steeple. A fatiguing 
climb to the top revealed that the fault was in the wind, which 
had remained due east for a fortnight. 

Mr. Moorhead, the first pastor, was ordained in Ireland, and 
was installed in Boston in 1730, a hundred years after the set- 
tlement. This was also the church of Jeremy lielknap, and of 
Dr. AV. E. Channing, for whom the neighboring street is named. 

It was to this church the Convention ad.journed from the 
Old State House, when it met to consider the adoption of the 
Federal Constitution, January 9, 1788. 

"The 'Vention did in Boston meet. 

But State House could not hold 'em ; 
So then they went to Federal Street, 
And there the truth was told 'em." 

Jeremy Belknap was then pastor of the ehnrcli. Jdliii Han- 



264 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

cock was president of the Convention, and George E. Minot 
vice-president. To the efforts of Hancock is largely due the 
adoption of the instrument. The joy of the people at the rati- 
fication was unbounded, and a monster procession celebrated 
the event, in which the mechanics of Boston, who had taken a 
lively interest in the jDroceedings, bore a prominent jDart. The 
naval hero, John Foster Williams, then living in Leverett's 
Lane (Congress Street), lent his aid after the following man- 
ner : — 

*' John Foster Williams, in a ship, 

Joined in the social band, sir ; 
And made the lasses dance and skip 

To see him sail on land, sir ! " 

In 1809 the Federal Street society erected a new and elegant 
house, designed by Charles Bulfinch. It was, when built, the 
only specimen of pure Saxon-Gothic architecture in Boston. 

In 1834 a number of Polish refugees arrived in this country, 
after the final dismemberment of their native land. One Sun- 
day Dr. Channing annoiinced that a collection would be taken 
up for the benefit of these exiles. The call was nobly responded 
to ; among others, Henry Purkett, a member of the Tea Party, 
and one of the sterling patriots of Eevolutionary times, sent 
his check couched in these words : — 

" Pay to Count Pulaski, my commander at the battle of Brandy- 
wine, his brethren, or bearer, one hundred dollars." 

Anciently Federal Street was known as Long Lane, but from 
the adoption of the Federal Constitution was known by its 
present name. What was true of the lower part of Franklin 
Street is equally so of Federal. There was once a sufticient 
depth of water near the meeting-house we have just described 
for smelts to be taken. Shaw cites Dr. Channing as saying he 
had taken these fish at the corner of Federal and Milk Streets, 
and another authority as having seen three feet of water in 
Federal Street. 

At the upper end of Federal Street, next the corner of Mil- 
ton Place, lived Madam Scott, the widow of Governor Han- 
cock. She married Captain James Scott in 1796. He had 



fPiOM THE OLD SOUTH ROUXD FOUT HILL. 205 

been long employed by the governor us niasU'r of a L(»ii(lon 
packet, and again, after the peace, sailed as master of the Nrp- 
tune, the first ship of a regidar line of London pa(;ki'ts. 
Madam Scott outlived her husband many years, retaining her 
faculties unimpaired until near the close of her life. She died 
in 1830, over eighty. She was the daughter of Judge Eihaund 
Quincy, of Braintree, and long celebrated for her wit and 
beauty. 

Dorothy Quincy was at Lexington with her affianced luisband 
(Hancock) when the battle of Lexington occurred, and looked 
out upon the fearful scenes of that morning. She knew Karl 
Percy well, and related that she had often hciird him drilHng 
his troops of a morning on the Common. Lafayette was a 
favorite with her, having l)een entertained by her in 1781. 
When the Marquis revisited Boston, in 1824, his first call was 
upon Madam Scott. They regarded each other intently for a 
few moments without speaking, each contemplating the ravages 
time and care had made in the features of the other. 

As Lafayette rode into town, receiving the private and lieart- 
felt homage of every individual of the immense tlirong tliat 
greeted him, he perceived his ancient hostess of more than forty 
years before, seated at a balcony on Tremont Street. The 
General directed his carriage to stop before the house, and, rising 
to his feet, with his hand upon his heart, made her a graceful 
salutation, which was as heartily returned. This little episode 
was loudly applauded by the spectators of the interesting 
meeting. 

The mansion of Robert Treat Paine, the cuiinont lawyer, 
judge, and signer of our Magna Charta, was at the west corner 
of ^lilk and Federal Streets. The house, a lu-ick one, fronted 
on ^lilk Street, and appeared in its latter days guiltless of 
paint. It was a large, two-story, gambrel-roof structure, witli 
gardens extending back some distance on Federal Street. In 
the yard was a large jack with a turn-spit, according to the 
culinary fashion of those days. In this house Judge Paine 
died May 11, 1814. A Bostonian by birth, i)upil and usher 
of the Latin School, he was a delegate to tli(! Provincial Con- 
12 



266 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

gress of 1774, at Philadelphia, and member of the Continental 
Congress ; he was the first attorney-general of Massachusetts, 
and member of the State Constitutional Convention ; and also 
judge of the Su^Jreme Court of the State. Judge Paine con- 
ducted the prosecution of Captain Preston. He was an able 
and witty writer ; as a man, beloved by his feUow-citizens who 
honored him with so many high public trusts. He was enter- 
taining in conversation, but subject in his later years, to fits of 
abstraction from which he woidd rouse himself with a pleasant 
smile and jest. 

The younger Robert Treat Paine was one of those brilliant 
geniuses which occasionally illuminate a community in which 
wit combined with sentiment commands a liigh value. He had 
a decided i^encliant for the theatre, and married an actress, — 
Miss Baker. He was first called Thomas, but, strongly disKk- 
ing the appellation of the great infidel Thomas Paine, he ap- 
pealed to the Legislature to give him a " Christian " name. 
He had been a patron of the little theatre in Board Alley, 
and assisted with his pen at the inauguration of the Boston 
Theatre. His father, as we know, lived hard by, and young 
Thomas was scarcely of age when he wrote the successful com- 
position. The greatest of his political lyrics, " Adams and 
Liberty," was written at the request of the IMassachusetts Char- 
itable Fire Society. As first composed, all mention of A¥ash- 
ington was — inadvertently, no doubt — omitted. Major Ben 
Pussell, in whose house Paine happened to be, interfered Avhen 
the poet was about to help himself from the sideboard, humor- 
ously insisting that he should not quench his thirst until he 
had in an additional stanza repaired the oversight. Paine 
thoughtfully paced the room a few moments, suddenly asked 
for a pen, and wrote the grand lines : — 

" Should the tempest of war oversliadow our land, 
Its holts coixld ne'er rend Freedom's temple asunder ; 
For unmoved at its portal would Washington stand, 
And repulse with his breast the assaults of the thunder. 

His sword from the sleep 

Of its scabbard would leap, 
And conduct with its point every flash to the deej) ; 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 2G7 

For ne'er shall the sons of Columbia be slaves, 

While the earth bears a plant, or the sea rolls its waves." 

The younger Paine died in 1811, three yeai-s before his 
father. Part of the garden lying on Federal .Street became 
the site of the Fourth Baptist Church. Church and dwelling 
long ago joined the shadowy procession of vanislied landmarks. 
Father and son Avere both buried from the family mansion. 

Before^ the oecupancy by Judge Paine, this house, it is said, 
hadJ^eenthe abode of Colonel John Erving, Jr., a merchant of 
high standing, and colonel of the Boston Pegiment. His father, 
the old Colonel John Erving, was an eminent merchant before 
him, and lived in Tremont Pow. The younger Erving was son 
in-law of Governor Shirley, and at-4iis-4ea^ the governor's 
funeral took place from the house of his relative, iMonday, 
April 1, 1771. A long procession followed the remains to King's 
Chapel, beneath which they Avere deposited. The Ancient and 
Honorable Artillery Company, commanded by Captain Heath;* 
the officers of the Boston Pegiment, in full regimentals with the 
usual mourning of black crape, attended. On the coffin were 
placed the two swords of the deceased, crossed. The pall was 
supported by Governor Hutchinson, Lieutenant-Governor Oliver, 
two judges of the Superior Court, and two of the Honorable 
Council. Dr. Caner preached the funeral sermon, after which 
the body was interred, the military firing three volleys, and a 
detachment of the Train of Artillery as many rounds as the 
deceased had lived years, namely, sixty-five. The governor 
wdll be remembered as a patron of King's Chapel, and it was 
doubtless liis expressed wish to be buried there. 

In that part of Congress Street lying north of AVater Street 
were the old Quaker Church and Burying Ground. The latter 
was situated opposite Lindall Street, and was the fourth in the 
town in antiquity, having been established in 1 709. The Friends 
built a brick meeting-house on that part of their lot subsequently 
occupied by the Transcript, and later by J. E. Farwell & Co. 
"The house was nearly destroyed in the groat fire of 1700, but 
was repaired the same year. Though once numerous, only eleven 

* Afterwards Major-General Heath. 



268 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

of the sect remained in Boston in 1744 ; their worship in this 
house ceased about 1808, and in 1827 the property was sold. 
The remains were exhumed by the Friends and taken to Lynn, 
where they again received burial. No interments were made 
in this cemetery later than about 1815. From time to time the 
relics of the Quakers have been thrown to the surface by the 
excavations on and near this site. At a later period the 
Friends erected a small stone house in Milton Place, Federal 
Street, which is still existing; but in 1848 it was conjectured 
there was not a single Quaker in Boston; in 1855 none were 
resident here, — the society, like the French Church, had be- 
come extinct. The house in Milton Place was once protected 
by a fence, and shaded by handsome trees, — all gone, and on 
the front a huge sign of " Wool " is erected. 

The Quakers have the distinction of having built the first 
brick meeting-house in Boston ; it was in Brattle Street, and 
dates back to 1692. This was disused in 1708, and the society 
removed to Congress Street. The sect seems to have flourished 
under persecution, dying out when it had ceased. The Quakers 
suffered every species of cruelty in establishing their fliith in 
Boston. Scourging and imprisonment were the mild means of 
prevention first employed ; banishment and the loss of an ear 
were subsequently decreed, — at least three persons lost this 
useful member by the hands of the public executioner about 
1658. Even under this severity the Quakers continued to in- 
crease and flourish. Selling them into slavery was tried and 
failed, and the death penalty was applied as a last resort. Four 
of the persecuted sect were hanged, and but for the fear of in- 
tervention by the crown the Puritans wouid have cut them ofl" 
root and branch. This occurred in 1660, rather more than two 
centuries ago. It must be remarked, however, that some of the 
observances of the early Quakers woidd not be tolerated even 
now. 

Congress Street has been mentioned as the headquarters of 
the Anthology Club, the first purely literary society we have 
an account of since the old war. 

In Itevolutionary times clubs were quite numerous in Boston, 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 2G0 

and formed the nuclei around wliich the patriots gatliered. One 
of the earliest of these was the Whig Club, of which James Otis, 
l)r. Church, Dr. AVarren, Dr. Young, Ivichard Derl)y of Salem, 
Ix'njaniin Kent, Nathaniel Jxirber, William ^lackay, Colonel 
Ijigelow of Worcester, and a few others were memljers. They 
corresponded with Wilkes, Colonel Barre, Saville, and otlier 
leaders of the opposition in Parliament. Civil liights and the 
British Constitution were the standing subjects of discussion. 

In 1777 — 78 there was another club, composed of youn<^ 
men fresh from college, among whom were liufus King, Chris- 
topher Gore, William Eustis, lioyal Tyler, Thomas Dawes, 
Aaron Dexter, etc. They met in Colonel Trund^ull's rooms at 
the corner of Court and Brattle Streets, and discussed jjolitics, 
literature, and war. 

The building on the northeast corner of Water and Congress 
Streets was formerly called Merchants' Hall, and in it were 
kept the United States Post-Office, and Merchants' Exchange 
in 1829. The new edifice designed for the former will there- 
fore be the second location upon the same street. The Post- 
Office occupied the lower floor. Aaron Hill was the post- 
master, with eight clerks, and one penny-postman. Toplifl"s 
Eeading Room shared the lower apartment with the Post-Office, 
and contained all mercantile intelligence useful to merchants 
"where they most do congregate." 

Upon this same spot once stood an old gambrel-roofed house 
with diamond-paned windows, a patriarch among its fellows. 
On the front was a bull's head and horns, from which the house 
was known as the Bull's Head. Over opposite was Horn Lane, 
since Bath Street. This was the habitation of George Bobert 
Twelves Hewes, a member of the Tea Party. His father was 
a glue-maker, soap-boiler, tanner, tallow-chandler, and perhaps 
filled up his leisure with other employments. Young Hewes 
was baptized at the Old South, and had a considerable share 
in the tumults worked up by the Boston mechanics. He lived 
to be ninety-eight years old, retaining a clear intellect until 
near the end of his long life-jouniey. 

Kobert Hewes's elder brother, Shubael Hewes, Avas Butcher- 



270 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



Master-General in the town while Howe held possession, and at 
one time during the siege six head of cattle was the entire stock 
in his hands for troops or inhabitants. His butcher-shop was 
at the south corner of Washington Street and Harvard Place, 
opposite the Old South, in an old building with a projecting 
upper story. A slaughter-house \Njas connected with the estab- 
lishment. People of wealth and position were glad to obtain 
the rejected portions of the slaughtered animals during the 
investment of the town. 




The old Julien House must ever remain an object of interest 
to all gastronomers. It was called " Julien's Eestorator," and 
was the first establishment noticed with this distinctive title ; 
all the rest were taverns or boarding-houses. M. Jean Baptiste 
Julien was the inventor of that agreeable potage which bears his 
name. He came to this country with the celebrated Dubuque, 
who was a refugee from the French Eevolution. Dubuque 
occupied for a time the Shirley mansion in Roxbury. The old 
house with its gables, overhanging upper stories, and huge 



FEOM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FOUT HILL. 11/1 

» 

chimney was taken down in 1824, and succeeded Ly Julien, 
afterwards Congress, Hall. Its site was once a tanyard. ^Vi'ter 
M. Julien's death in 1805 his widow succeeded him, keepin;^' 
the house for ten years. It is supposed to have been built 
about 1760. 

That part of Congress Street lying south of Milk was 
formerly Green Lane, and in 1732 was named Atkinson Street, 
from an old family whose lands it passed through. The ancient 
proprietors of the soil, who gave their lands to make our high- 
ways, did not stipulate that the original names should remain 
unchanged, like the far-seeing Chief Justice Sewall. One in- 
stance is mentioned of an individual who had lived on eight 
different streets within fifty years, but had never moved from 
his original dwelling. Hence the maps of Boston at various 
periods bear but little resemblance to each other ; and he who 
visits only occasionally distant localities finds himself lost. 
The happy expedient was hit upon of renewing some of the 
old names in the new part of the city, and we have Newbury 
and Marlborough, where they may well baffle some future in- 
quirer. In Green's Barracks in Atkinson Street were quartered 
part of the 14th Royal Regiment at the time of the Massacre. 

As we are now in the route of the Tea Party, we will con- 
tinue with it through Pearl Street. Before taking leave of 
Milk Street, however, we must remark that it had some other 
residents not unknown to fame. Below us is Oliver Street, 
named for that family. The quarters of General Howe were in 
a house at the corner of Oliver and ^lilk Streets. To him, 
probably, was confided the immediate charge of the troops and 
works in and around Fort Hill. * 

In ]\Iilk Street was the residence of Thomas Flucker, Secre- 
tary of the Province under Hutchinson, whose name is seen 
appended to the official papers of that interesting period. 

Flucker's daughter, Lucy, married General Knox. AVe have 
seen her sharing the privations of camp life with her husband 
wherever his duty called him. She was a lovely and highly 
accomplished woman, contributing greatly to the little female 
circle around the American headquarters. Through this mar- 



272 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

riage Knox became possessed of a large estate at Thomaston, 
Me., named for General John Thomas. 

Admiral Graves, of the fleet, seems to have preferred snug 
quarters ashore to the cabin of the flagship, for he took up his 
residence at the southeast corner of Pearl and High Streets, 
where he might have ready access to his shipping. Tlie admi- 
ral, it will be remembered, was exem^Jted, with Gage, from 
pardon by the Provincial Congress. 

Tlie great fire of March 20, 1760, which began at the Brazen 
Head, in Cornhill, consumed every house on the north side of 
Milk Street, from Congress Street to the water, and on the 
opposite side it swept all before it — the dwelling of Secretary 
Oliver and a few tenements excepted — to Port Hill. The 
Battery, or Sconce, took fire and blew up, notwithstanding a 
large part of the j)owder was thrown into the harbor, Governor 
Hutchinson personally assisting in this labor. All the region 
now known as Liberty Square was burnt over, — shops, ware- 
houses, and the shipyard that has been noted ; so that from 
Devonshire Street to tlie water's edge, from Milk Street to the 
north side of State Street, scarcely a house remained standing. 

Oliver Street was very badly paved with cobble-stones some 
time before the Eevolution, as far as the Wendell and Oliver 
Houses, beyond which there was no pavement. High, and all 
the neighboring Streets, were unpaved, as late as 1808. At 
this time there was a brick sidewalk on the north side of Pearl 
Street, but none on the other, and some gentlemen caused a 
plank walk to be laid from High Street up the hill to their 
residences at the top. The old Eevolutionary fort was levelled 
and converted into a mall since 1797, the ground lying around 
it remaining in possession of the town until after 1800. 

Kilby Street, noticed at its outlet into State, was named for 
Christopher Kilby, an eminent Boston merchant, on account of 
his liberality to the sufferers by the great fire of 1760, when 
the street was newly laid out and widened. Mr. Charles W. 
Tuttle says a descendant of Christopher Kilby married the 
seventh Duke of Argyle, grandfather of the Marquis of Lome,' 
lately married to the Princess Louise of England. Kilby re- 
sided in Queen Street. 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 273 

On the map of 1722 no street is laid down wliere the present 
Pearl Street is, but a number of ropewalks extend in its general 
direction from Cow Lane (High Street) towards ISIilk. In 1732 
the alley along the ropewalks obtained the name of Hutchinson 
Street, changed in 1800 to Pearl. In 177'1 there was but a 
single house on the east side, — that of Charles Paxton, Es(|., an 
elegant three-story brick, some little distance from iSIilk Street. 
Paxton was one of the revenue commissioners, and was not for- 
gotten by the mob which called at Secretary Oliver's. He had, 
however, made his escape with his valuables, and the owner of 
the house saved his property by proposing to broach a barrel 
of punch at the tavern near by. The mob accepted the alter- 
native. Paxton was also a mandamus councillor, and proscribed 
by the Provincial Congress, with Jonathan Sewall and Benja- 
min HaUow^ell. 

The west side of the street was occupied in its entire length, 
at the date mentioned, by seven ropewalks ; these were all burnt 
in 1794, and the street became dotted with the residences of 
the wealthy and refined. 

The first rope-maker in Boston was John Harrison, whose 
" rope-field " was on Purchase Street, at the foot of Summer ; 
the former street now occupies the ground. From this circum- 
stance arises the name Purchase, part of the way having been 
thus secured. Harrison first exercised this calling here in 1642, 
and in 1663 appealed to the selectmen not to license a rival 
artisan in the town. Isaac P Davis, whose middle name is the 
capital letter only, was the last rope-maker in Boston. 

The Grays were the most celebrated rope-makers of Boston. 
Edward, the senior, first served an apprenticeship with Barton, 
at Barton's Point, now West Boston. In 1712 he began making 
ropes on the Pearl Street tract, purchased of Theodore Atkin- 
son. He was the father of Harrison Gray, treasurer of the 
province, and of John, who succeeded to the ropewalks, seven 
hundred and forty-four feet long, warehouse, dwelling, and out- 
houses, — a snug patrimony. 

" In that building long and low, 
With its windows all a-row, 
Like the port-holes of a luilk, 
12* » 



274 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Human spiders spin and spin, 
Backward down their threads so thin, 
Dropj>ing each a hempen bulk," 

Harrison Gray, treasurer of the colony, and grandfather of 
Harrison Gray Otis, was proscribed, and had his estates confis- 
cated after his flight from Boston. It is stated, in Sabine's 
Loyalists, that in August, 1775, inquiry was made in the 
House of Representatives concerning the horse and chaise, 
formerly Harrison Gray's, which was used by the late Dr. 
(General) Warren, and came into the hands of the committee 
of supplies after Dr. Warren's death. The horse and chaise 
appears to have been traced to Dr. William Eustis, afterwards 
governor, as he was directed the next day to deliver it to the 
committee named. Mr. Gray went first to Halifax, thence to 
London, where his house was the resort of the Boston refugees. 
Of him it was written : — 

" What Puritan could ever pray- 
In godlier tones than Treasurer Gray ; 
Or at town-meetings, speechifying, 
Could utter more melodious whine, 
And shut his eyes and vent his moan, 
Like owl afflicted in the sun ! " 

At these ropewalks began the conflicts between the soldiers 
and rope-makers, wliich culminated in the 5tli of March affair. 
Among the soldiers were a good many mechanics, who were 
often employed as journeymen. One of these inquired of a 
negro workman at Mr. Gray's if his master wished to hire a 
man. The negro answered that " his master wished to have 
his vault emptied, and that was a proper work for a Lobster" 
For this insolent remark the soldier gave the negro a severe 
beating. Mr. Gray came up, parted them, and endeavored to 
persuade the soldier to return to his barracks, but the latter 
cursed him, and offered for sixpence to serve him as he had 
done the negro. Mr. Gray took him at his word, and after a 
sound thrashing, the soldier rushed off to his barracks at 
Wheelwright's, now Foster's Wharf, swearing vengeance. But, 
in the language of Pope, — 

" What direful contests rise from trivial things ! " 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 275 

The soldier returned in half an liour with nearly seventy of 
his comrades of the l-ith, armed with pipe-staves which tlicy 
liad obtained at a cooper's shop. Tliey made a furious attiick 
upon the ropewalk men, who stood firm, and finally repulsed 
their assailants, pursuing them over the hill. The soldiers, rein- 
forced to the number of about three hundred, headed by tlieir 
sergeant-major, returned with redoubled fury to the contlict, but 
the rope-makers had been joined by the brawny shipwrights, 
mast and block makers, from Hallowell's shi])yard at tlie foot 
of Milk Street, armed with their beetles, wedges, and marlin- 
spikes. The soldiers pulled down the fence in High Street en- 
closing the field, since Quincy Place, and the ropewalk men 
levelled that on Pearl Street. A terrific melee ensued, but the 
athletic mechanics of Fort Hill were too much for the soldiery, 
who were again worsted. This occurred on the 3d of March, 
1770 ; the massacre in King Street took place on the 5th. 

The northwest corner of Pearl Street is the site of the Pearl 
Street House, opened in 1836 by Colonel Shepard, formerly of 
the Indian Queen in Bromfield Street. The house is now 
standing, devoted to business. It was the first erected on tlie 
south side of the street, after the ropewalks, and was built by 
Mr. Gorham for a residence. 

On the opposite corner resided Mr. John Prince, a gentleman 
of tory proclivities, who, however, did not join the royalist 
hegira of 1776. His estate, which had a court-yard and gar- 
dens, was altered by him in about 1812, when he built a block 
ot five buildings, the centre house twice as large as the others, 
for his own residence. It had a roof with a pediment raised 
above the others, giving the whole block somewhat the appear- 
ance of a public ediHce. After residing there for a fi'W years, 
he removed to a beautiful residence at Jamaica Plain, and tliis 
Pearl Street mansion became the boarding-house of Mrs. Le 
Kain. 

In this house John Gaspard Spur/.licim, tlie gifted Prussian 
phrenologist, resided during his visit to Boston, and here, also, 
he died, in the same year of his arrival in tliis country. He 
lies buried at Blount Auburn, his tomb being a conspicuous 
object in that filmed cemetery. 



276 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Attached to the estate of Mr. Prince was a large bam. This 
was Washington Allston's studio after his return to Boston, and 
until his removal to Cambridgeport, in consequence of the con- 
version of the barn into a livery-stable. Here his large picture 
of Belshazzar's Feast, now in the Athenaeum Gallery, was rolled 
up and laid aside, although he worked at it a little at this time. 

Allston was the antipodes of Stuart. He was refined, gentle, 
and unassuming ; a charming companion, and a great favorite 
in society. Besides being a painter, he wrote verses, and a vol- 
ume of his poems was published. Coleridge said he was un- 
surpassed by any man of his age in poetical and artistic genius. 
For many years after Allston left Rome every American was 
questioned by the native artists for news of the American 
Titian ; it was generally conceded that for two hundred years 
no artist's coloring had so closely resembled that of the great 
master. 

His Dead Man won the first prize of two hundred guineas 
from the British Institution, and the artist could have disposed 
of it for a large sum on the spot, but he preferred to sell it for 
less than its value to the Pennsylvania Academy, through 
Messrs. McMurtie and Sully. Allston employed his leisure 
hours at Harvard in drawing figures and landscapes. The pic- 
tures of Pine, in the Columbian Museum, Boston, were his first 
masters in coloring; but, most of all, he admired a head of 
Cardinal Bentivoglio, by Smibert, in the College library, while 
a student. This was a copy from Vandyke, and seemed perfec- 
tion to the young artist until he saw works of greater merit. 

Allston continued to paint industriously and successfully 
until his death, which occurred at Cambridge, July 9, 1843. 
He had painted all day, and during the evening conversed with 
unusual cheerfulness. His wife left the room for a few moments, 
and when she returned he was dying. Allston was liberally 
patronized, and no American painter of his day received such 
prices. His first wife was a sister of William Ellery Channing ; 
a sister of Richard H. Dana was the Mrs. Allston who survived 
him. De Tocqueville went to Cambridgeport on purpose to 
see the artist ; and the first inquiry of Lord Morpeth, when he 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 277 

landed in Boston, was, " Where does AUston live I " A niiiu- 
ber of liis pictures are preserved in the Atheuieum (Jalltuy, 
including several unfinished works. The late S. F. li. Mijrso 
was a pupil of Allston. 

The house next beyond that of Mr. Prince was tliat in wliich 
Theophilus Parsons, LL. I)., lived after his removal to IVjston 
in 1800, and in which he died. Judge Parsons, as chief of the 
Massachusetts Bench, as one of the framers of the State Consti- 
tution, or as a zealous advocate for the adoption of the Federal 
Constitution, ranks high in the estimation of his countrymen. 

An instance of Judge Parsons's address is given in connection 
with the convention in Federal Street. One of the delegates, 
Eev. Mr. Perley, of Maine, refused to vote for an instrument 
which did not acknowledge the Supreme Being. The lawyer 
undertook to argue him out of his position. " I suppose," said 
Mr. Parsons, " that in the course of your ministerial labors you 
have preached from texts in every book of the Old Testament." 
"Yes," said Mr. Perley, "I probably have." "You have 
preached from texts in the Book o^ Esther 1 " " Doubtless I 
have," said Mr. Perley. " Do you know that in the Book of 
Esther," said Mr. Parsons, " there is not a single allusion to the 
Supreme Being ] " " It is not possil)le," said Mr. Perley. 
" Look 1 " said Mr. Parsons. The search was made. " You 
are right," said Mr. Perley, and the clergyman confessed his 
scruples removed. 

Theophilus Parsons, the younger, is best known by excellent 
works on commercial law, and for other labors in the literary 
field. He studied law with Judge Prcscott, father of the his- 
torian, and son of the commander at Bunker Hill. 

Xext the house of Judge Parsons was that of Paxton, or 
Palmer. This house was divided, and became the residence of 
James Lovell, the naval officer, and of Thomas Handasyd Per- 
kins, so well remembered for his munificent contribution in aid 
of a blind asylum. Between this mansion and the (j^uincy 
estate a field intervened. 

Colonel Perkins was one of the most eminiMit of Boston 
merchants, and, with his brother James, engaged largely iu the 



278 ' LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

China and Java trade. Amassing great wealth, both brothers 
contributed freely to benevolent or literary objects. The atten- 
tion of Colonel T. H. Perkins was probably tirst drawn to the 
blind by the partial loss of his own si^ht. The Quincy Eail- 
way, and the Washington and Bunker Hill Monuments were 
each objects of his interest and efforts. He laid the corner-stone 
of the Merchants' Exchange in State Street, and liberally aided 
the Mercantile Library. He was, in common with some of his 
neighbors, an ardent opponent of the war policy of Mr. Madison. 

When Colonel Perkins was in Paris, during a period of ap- 
prehended revolution, Lafayette conhded his son, George Wash- 
ington, to his care, and the latter lived for some time in his 
family in Boston. 

Immediately behind the mansion of Mr. Perkins was the 
residence of Andrew Oliver, lieutenant-governor under Hutch- 
inson's regime, distributor of stamps, etc. The house stood 
near Oliver Street, though it did not appear to have fronted 
upon it. Its condition was so dilapidated in 1808 as to afford 
little idea of its former appearance. It was in good repair after 
the Eevolution, and occupied by families of respectability. 

Mr. Oliver was visited by the mob who overthrew the stamp- 
ofhce at the dock, not far distant. Governor Bernard recites in 
his proclamation that the secretary's liouse was entered with 
force and violence, his furniture damaged, windows broken, and 
fences pulled down, to the great terror of his Majesty's liege 
subjects. The secretary, apprehensive of a second visit from 
his fellow-citizens, thought it prudent to resign his office forth- 
with. Mr. Hutchinson was present at Oliver's house when the 
mob attacked it ; he used his endeavors to suppress the riot 
with force, but neither the sheriff nor the colonel of the Boston 
Eegiment thought proper to interfere. Peter Oliver, brother of 
Andrew, was chief justice in 1771, adhered to the royal cause, 
and left Boston with the king's troops. 

Secretary Oliver died in Boston in 1774. He was one of the 
most affluent of the Old Bostonians, and had a private estab- 
lishment rivalling that of any in the province. Coaches, chariot, 
negro slaves, and good sterling plate in abundance attested his 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 279 

wealth. He was a generous patron of Smi])ert, wlio i)ainted 
all the family portraits, including one in whi(;h the secretary 
and his two brothers were represented. Andrew Oliver wished 
to stand well with his countrymen, and at the same time enjoy 
the emoluments of an officer of the crown. He soon found the 
two were incompatible, and passed from the stage soon after 
the events occurred that have given notoriety to his name. On 
the opposite side of Oliver Street was the residence of Judge 
Oliver AVendell. It fronted towards the east, with grounds 
adjoining. 

Quincy Block marks the site of the Quincy estate, which 
extended to High Street. Here Mr. Quincy passed the earlier 
years of his married life, until elected to Congress in 1805, 
when the mansion was occupied by Christopher Gore. It is 
described by Miss Quincy as 

" A handsome edifice of three stories, the front ornamented with 
Corinthian pilasters ; and j)illars of the same order supported a 
porch, from which three flights of red sandstone steps, and a broad 
walk of the same material, descended to Pearl Street. Honeysuckles 
were twined around the porch, and high damask rose-bushes grew 
beneath the windows ; at the comer of Pearl and High Streets stood 
the stable and coach-house. The grounds ascending towards Oliver 
Street were formed into a glacis, and were adorned with four English 
elms of full size and beauty, the resort of numerous birds, especially 
of the oriole, or golden robin." 

Christopher Gore was a Bostonian by birth, and an emin«Mit 
lawyer. It was in his office that Daniel AVebster read law, and 
by iiis advice that the latter continued steadfast in the i)r(.fes- 
sion when beguiled by some offer of place which might liavo 
terminated his great career. ^Ir. Gore was the lii-st district 
attorney appointed by Washington over tlie ]\rass;ichusetts dis- 
trict ; he was also a commissioner under Jay's treaty, and a 
United States senator. In 1809 he was elected governor of 
Massachusetts. This was the period of the embargo of Mr. 
Jefferson, and of the stirring scenes preceding the war of 1812. 
The temper of the Bostonians was decidedly advers(> to tho 
measure ; the mercantile class, whose interests were most nearly 



280 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

affected, were bitter in tlieir comments upon the administration. 
Colonel Boyd, commanding at Fort IndejDendence, received 
orders to fire upon any vessel attempting to violate the embargo, 
upon which the colors on the shipping were placed at half-mast. 
The Wasp, afterwards conqueror of the Frolic, lay in the stream 
watching the idle vessels, and threats were freely made to burn 
her. 

William Sullivan says. Governor Gore was tall, a little in- 
clined to corpulency in middle age, and erect, but began to 
bend at an earlier age than common. He became bald at an 
unusually early period. His hair was tied behind and dressed 
with powder. His face was round and florid, his eyes black ; 
his manners courteous and amiable. Gore Hall, at Harvard, com- 
memorates a magnificent bequest to the University in his will. 

On the site of the Athenaeum one sees the block of that 
name ; we wish the custom prevailed more generally of thus 
distinguishing localities. In the hall of the Athenaeum the 
disciples of Baron Swedenborg held their worship ; the society 
has existed in Boston since 1818, receiving legislative sanction 
in 1823. It has been mentioned that the Athenaeum owed 
their building to the munificence of James Perkins. Quincy 
Place and Perkins Street are visible memorials of two distin- 
guished families. 

High Street has ceased to be high, and, to keep pace with 
the custom of the times, should receive a more appropriate 
title. Of yore it mounted the height to the esplanade of Fort 
Hill ; now it has sunk to a monotonous level. Sister Street 
rejoices in the name as well as the smell of Leather, while Wil- 
liams Street, named for John Foster Williams, is metamorphosed 
into Matthews. Pearl Street is the acknowledged shoe and 
leather mart of the country, and has furnished the State with 
at least one chief magistrate. The Hutchinsons, Atkinsons, 
Grays, Perkinses, Quincys, Parsonses, Gridleys, and the rest, 
have shed a lustre round the ancient hillside, though granite 
now usurps the terraced gardens, and drays instead of chariots 
stand at the doors. 

Fort Hill Block, on the corner of High and Pearl Streets, 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 281 

marks the site of a manunoth structure erected for a private 
residence, and known as Harris's Folly. Extensive gardens 
reached up the hill, quite to the enclosure at the top. In ISOO 
all the land was open to the mall on the summit of the hill. 
The northwest corner of Pearl and High was for a time the 
location of the Congress House, altered from a private residence 
into a hotel. 

Proceed we onward to Purchase Street, anciently Belcher's 
Lane, the birthplace of Thomas Dawes, afterwards a judge of 
the Supreme Court of the State, and of the ^lunicipal Court 
of Boston ; and of Samuel Adams, the great central figure of 
the patriot junta. The elder Thomas Dawes was the architect 
of Brattle Street Church. He was a high patriot, and the 
caucuses were sometimes held in his garret, where they smoked 
tobacco, drank flip, and discussed the state of the country. 
Dawes was also adjutant of the Boston Regiment. The tories 
gave him the nickname of " Jonathan Smoothing-plane." 

A short descent brings us to Liverpool Wharf. Where now 
Broad Street winds around the margin of the water, the old 
footpath under the hill was known as- Flounder Lane ; Sea 
Street was its continuation to Windmill Point. Beyond this 
point the Sea Street of later times was built straight into the 
harbor, enclosing the South Cove ; it is now known as Broad 
Street in its entire length, from State Street to the South 
Boston Bridge. 

Liverpool Wharf, then Griffin's, was the destination of the 
Tea Party of December 16, 1773. It was a cold wintry after- 
noon, when 

"Just as glorious Sol was setting, 
On the wharf a numerous crew, 
Sons of freedom, fear forgetting, 
Suddenly appeared in view," 

The three Indiamen, with their high poops and ornamented 
sterns, were lying quietly moored at the wharf. They had 
been for some time under guard of a committee of twenty-five 
from the grenadier company of the Boston Regiment, of which 
Henry Knox was one. The hatches were closed, and this vigi- 
lance committee took care no attempt was made to land the 



:^. 




282 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

cargo. 'The names of the three ships were the Dartmouth, 
Captain James Hall, The Eleanor, Captain James Bruce, and 
brig Beaver, Captain Hezekiah Coffin. 

The number of persons disguised as Indians was not more 
than seventeen, but the accessions from the 
Old South, and of apprentice lads and idlers, 
|W, swelled the number to more than a hundred ; 
as many as sixty went on board the ships. 
MtS." -« Each ship had a detachment allotted to it 
under a recognized leader ; Lendall Pitts 
was one of these chiefs. Everything was 
orderly, systematic, and doubtless previously concerted. The 
leaders demanded of those in charge of the ships the keys to 
the hatches, candles, and matches, which were produced. The 
Dartmouth was first visited and relieved of her cargo of one 
hundred and fourteen chests. As the chests were passed on 
deck, they were smashed, and nervous arms j)lunged them into 
the dock. The contents of three hundred and forty-two chests 
mingled with the waters of the bay, and the work was done. 

It was low tide when the ships were boarded, and the ap- 
prentice boys, who formed the larger number of those engaged 
in the affair, jumped upon the flats, and assisted in breaking 
up and trampling into the mud such of the chests as had 
escaped the hatchets of those on board the vessels. The tide 
beginning to flow, the whole mass was soon adrift. 

We give the names of the actors in this conversion of Bos- 
ton harbor into a teapot, as far as known : Dr. Thomas Young, 
Paul Eevere, Thomas Melvill, Henry Purkett, Captain Henry 
Prentiss, Samuel Gore, George R. T. Hewes, Joseph Shed, 
John Crane, Josiah Wheeler, Thomas Urann, Adam Colson, 
Thomas Chase, S. Cooledge, Joseph Payson, James Brewer, 
Thomas Bolter, Edward Proctor, Samuel Sloper, Thomas Ger- 
rish, Nathaniel Green, Edward C. How, Ebenezer Stevens, 
Nicholas Campbell, John Eussell, Thomas Porter, William 
Hurdley, Benjamin Rice, Nathaniel Frothingham, Moses Grant, 
Peter Slater, James Starr, Abraham Tower, Isaac Simpson, 
Joseph Eayres, Joseph Lee, WiUiam Molineux, John Spurr, 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 283 

Thomas Moore, S. Howard, ^latthew Loring, Thomas Spear, 
Daniel Ingollson, Jonathan Hunnewell, John Hooten, llichard 
Hunnewell, William Pierce, William- Russell, T. Gammell, Mr, 
]\IcIntosh,- Mr. Wyeth, Edward Dolbier, ^h\ Martin, Samuel 
Peek, Lendall Pitts, Samuel Sprague, Benjamin Clarke, John 
Prince, Richard Hunnewell, Jr., David Kinnison, John Truman, 
Henry Bass, Joseph ^lountfort, William Hurd, Joseph Palmer, 
Joseph Coolidge, Obadiah Curtis, James Swan, Mr. Kingson, 
and Isaac Pitman.* 

There are authorities who give Dr. Warren as a member of the 
Mohawk Band. Many incidents are related of this event. It is 
said that on their return from the wharf the band passed a house 
where Admiral jMontague of the fleet happened to be, and that he 
raised the window and cried out, " Well, boys, you've had a tine 
pleasant evening for your Indian caper, have n't you] But mind 
you have got to pay the fiddler yet ! " ' " 0, never mind ! " shouted 
Pitts, the leader ; " never mind. Squire ! just come out here, 
if you please, and we '11 settle the bill in two minutes." The 
populace raised a shout, the lifer struck up a lively air, and the 
admiral shut the window in a hurry. A powerful fleet lay in 
the roads ; the trooj^s were at the Castle, yet not a move Avas 
made to arrest the work of destruction. 

Thomas Melvill, in aft3r times a distinguished citizen of 
Boston, was of the party. On his return home his wife col- 
lected a little of the tea from his shoes, which was put into a 
bottle with a memorandum written on parchment, and kept as 
a precious relic in the family. Many came to see the famous 
herl), until at last it was found necessary to seal it, to preserve 
it from vandal hands. This bottle of tea is now in ])()ss('ssion 
of Lemuel Shaw of this city, son of the late Judge Shaw. 

John Crane, another of the party, while busily emjiloyiMl in 
the hold of one of the ships, was knocked down by a chest of 
tea, falling from the deck upon him. He was taken \ip for 
dead, and concealed in a neighboring carpenter's shoj) under a 
pile of shavings. After the party had flnished they returned, 
and found Crane living. 

* Some of these names are from Lossing's Field-Book. 



284 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Several persons who were detected in tlie act of secreting 
the fragrant plant were roughly handled. 

" One Captain O'Connor," says Hewes, " whom I well knew, came 
on hoard for this purpose, and when he supposed he was not noticed, 
filled his pockets, and also the lining of his coat. But I had de- 
tected him, and gave information to the captain of what he was 
doing. We were ordered to take him into custody, and just as he 
was stepping from the vessel, I seized him hy the skirt of his coat, 
and in attempting to pull him hack, I tore it off ; but springing for- 
ward by a rapid effort, he made his escajje. He had, however, to run 
the gantlet of the crowd upon the wharf ; each one as he passed giv- 
ing him a kick or a stroke. The next day we nailed the skirt of his 
coat, which I had pulled off, to the whipping-post in Charlesto^vn, 
the place of his residence, with a label upon it." 

Griffin's Wharf, as well as Wheelwright's, had a number of 
large warehouses, in which had been quartered the detachment 
of the 59th, and the train of artillery which landed in Octo- 
ber, 1768. A fire caught in one of the stores used as a labor- 
atory in March, 1760, aiid an explosion occurred, injuring sev- 
eral men and terrifying the neighborhood. 

Eowe's Wharf coincides with the old Southern Battery or 
Sconce, an outwork of Fort Hill, and terminus in this direction 
of the famous Barricado. As early as 1632 a fort was begun 
on the eminence then called Corn Hill, but soon changed to the 
Fort-field, and finally to Fort Hill. The Bostonians were aided 
by their brethren from Charlestown, Eoxbury, and Dorchester ; 
two years after, it was declared in a state of defence. 

The Sconce was probably not built until some time after the 
main work, perhaps at the time of the Dutch war. It was con- 
structed of whole timber, with earth and stone between, and 
was considered very strong. In time of peace it was in charge 
of a gunner only, but had its company assigned to it in case of 
danger. In 1705 it was commanded by Captain Timothy 
Clark, who was ordered to furnish an account of the ordnance, 
ammunition, etc., "meete to bee offered hys Grace the Duke 
of Marlborough Great Master of her Majestye's Ordnance." 
In 1743 the battery mounted thirty-five guns ; at this time no 
work appears on the summit of the hill. In 1774 Jeremiah 



FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 285 

Green "was captain with the rank of major. The JJritish con- 
tinued to liokl it with a garrison, and had a laboratory there. 
Colonel Pomeroy's regiment, the 6-4th, occupied the hill in 
Xovember, 17G8 ; the Welsh Fusileers, who had won a splendid 
name for valor at Minden, were posted there in 1774, and in 
1775 the works contained four hundred men. After the evacu- 
ation the works were found gi'eatly damaged, but were occu- 
pied and strengthened by the Americans. Du Portail, chief 
engineer of the American army, came to Boston in October, 
1778, to make a survey of the works, when this with others 
was strengthened and put in the best posture of defence. Sub- 
sequently, in 1779, when AVashington was fortifying the passes 
of the Hudson on a great scale, the heavy guns were removed 
from all the works here and sent forward to the army against 
which Clinton was then advancing. 

The battery and fort acquire a celebrity as the theatre of 
the seizure and deposition of Governor Andros. In April, 1089, 
the news of the landing of the Prince of Orange at Torbay 
reached Boston, and threw the town into a fcn-ment. The gov- 
ernor, Ptandolph, and some others sought the security of the 
fort ; the drums beat to arms, and the inhabitants ran from all 
quarters to the Town House, where they joined their respective 
companies. The captain of a frigate which lay before the town 
was seized on shore, and held as a hostage. Ai)proaching the 
hill by the rear, the train-bands divided, a part going an.und by 
the water to the battery. A few soldiers in this work rctn-ated 
up the hill to the main body, and the townsmen turned the 
guns upon them. Andros cursed and fumed, but was forced to 
yield himself a prisoner, with his companions. Some were 
imprisoned in the old jail ; his Excellency was placed untler 
guard at Mr. Usher's house. The frigate still showeil tiglit, and 
lay with her ports triced up, and her men at ([uarters ; but 
after the people had got possession of all the forlilications and 
pointed the guns at her, the captain was ('onijx'lled to send 
down his topmasts, unbend his sails, and send them ashon\ 1 he 
keys of the Castle were next extorted from Andros, and the 
bloodless revolution was ended. It is said Sir IMnuuid was 



286 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON". 

handcuffed as he was conducted from the fort ; we may well 
believe he was not allowed to pass through the ranks of the 
townsmen without some reminders of his fallen state. 

Probably Old Boston never knew a day of greater rejoicing 
than that which brought the news of Burgoyne's surrender. 
The rumor of the falling back of the American army to Still- 
water had been received with deep forebodings for the future, 
speedily dissipated by the glad tidings of the greatest victory 
of the war. A thundering salute was fired from Fort Hill and 
Dorchester ^eck. Hope animated every heart anew, and joy 
was visible in every countenance. 

From the Sconce, the lane leading up the hill to the fort was 
named Sconce Lane, since Hamilton Street, and the walk along 
the beach the Batterymarch. 

A specimen of the small arms in use at the time of the set- 
tlement is in the Historical Society's possession. The guns 
were without locks, match or fuse being used at the rate of 
two fathoms for every pound of powder and twenty bullets ; 
pikes were still in use for foot-soldiers. 

"Where are those old and feudal clans, 
Their pikes and bills and partisans ; 
Their hauberks, jerkins, buffs ? 
A battle was a battle then, 
A breathing piece of work ; but men 
Fight now with powder puffs," 

The building lately occupied by a Glass Company at the 
corner of Hamilton Street was the residence of Benjamin Hal- 
lowell, grandfather of the admiral. It became afterwards a 
noted inn, known as the " Sun," and kept by Goodrich in 
1822. 

This old Sun Tavern, now while we write nearly demolished, 
is the third or fourth of that name in Boston. One of the 
same name was in Dock Square in 1724, kept by Samuel 
Mears ; another was in Cornhill in 1755, kept by Captain 
James Day : we may suppose the conjunction of names did 
not escape the wits of the day. The sign of the Sun in Bat- 
terymarch Street has been compared in shape to a gravestone, 
with its circular top. There the likeness ended ; for underneath 
the rays of a gilded su>n was the legend, — 



* FROM THE OLD SOUTH ROUND FORT HILL. 287 

" The best Ale and Porter 
Under the Sun." 

By a curious transition the sign was afterwards erected in 
Moon Street, where it became the proper symbol of Mrs. ]Milk, 
whose mixtures were perhaps not as mild as the name indicated. 
Few of her customers escaped a coup de soleil ; her neighbors 
were Waters, Beer, and Legg. Sun Court, near by, retiected 
the name of the greater luminary. 

At the east corner of Milk Street and Liberty Square was 
the Commercial Coffee House, built on the site of Hallowell's 
shipyard. It was kept by AVilliam Meriani from 1817 until 
about 1830, and was a house of considerable resort for ship- 
masters. In 1838 Jolin Low was landlord, and later Colone*! 
AVhitney. Its place is now occupied by Thorndike's granite 
building. Here was in 1798 the principal shipyard in the 
town, from which was launched the ship Genet fully rigged, 
and named in honor of the then French minister to this 
country. 

Siste Viator. We were about to invite the reader to ascend 
Fort Hill. The waters of the harbor have swallowed the emi- 
nence, and it is as completely obliterated as if an earthquake 
had engulfed it. The base indeed is left, but it reijuires a 
strong imagination to picture an elevation eighty feet above us, 
bearing on its top the elegant mansions of a past generation, 
with the tops of noble elms waving in the cool sea-breezes. 
Yet this was the peculiar spot to which residents were invited 
fifty years ago, with the assurance that the green park on its top 
would afford a perpetual place of recreation. 

The streets which struggled up the sides of tlie hill were once 
peopled with a highly respectable class, but Broad Street and 
the outlying works were soon carried by Irish, and the citadel 
was yielded to them. From the hill radiated the wharves, like 
the fingers of the hand ; the eastern slope was ]ieopled by ship 
artisans and mechanics pertaining to that craft. The summit 
of the hill was levelled so as to form a plateau, in the centre 
of which was the grass-plat encircled with an iron fence and 
studded with trees. On the south side was built the Buylston 



288 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

School and gun-house of the Washington Artillery ; the space 
enclosed by the buildings on the other sides was called Wash- 
ington Place. The school received its name in honor of Thomas 
and Ward Nicholas Boylston, liberal benefactors of Boston and 
the neighboring University. A windmill was erected on the 
hill in the year 1701. 

The Washington Artillery Company, on one of its annual 
visits to East Boston for target-practice, gave a sample of their 
gunnery by knocking over a cow with a twelve-pounder shot. 
The owner received the price demanded for the slaughtered 
animal. The company, with a keen eye to business, had the 
cow dressed and sold at a considerable advance on the price 
paid the owner. 

The land from the hill-top no doubt furnished the material 
for filling up the docks east of Kilby and Batterymarch Streets. 
The old fort had disappeared long before the Revolution, and it 
was not until then that the hill was again fortified. In 1869 
the levelling of the hill was ordered, and fully completed within 
three years. A dreary waste of gravel flanlved by bare founda- 
tion walls, a stump here and there of the once noble ehns, are 
all that is left of Fort Hill. Sic ii^ansit. 



A TOUR KOUND THE COMMON. 289 



CHAPTER X. 

A TOUR ROUXD THE COMMON. 

Long Acre. — Tremont House. — Mr. Clay. — President Jackson. — Charles 
Dickens. — Little House-lot. — Tremont Theatre. — The Cadets. — Adino 
Paddock. — Paddock's ]\Iall. — Granary Burying-Ground. — The Granary, 

— Almshouse. — Workhouse. — Bridewell. — Park Street Church. — Man- 
ufactory House. — Linen-Spinning Introduced. — Elisha Brown. — Massa- 
chusetts Bank. — Licident of the Lexington Expedition. — The Common. 

— Its Origin. — The Great Mall. — Fences. — Winter Street. — Governor 
Bernard. — John McLean. — Samuel Adams. — St. Paul's. — Masonic Tem- 
ple. — Margaret Fuller. — Washington Gardens. — The Haymarket. — 
West Street. — The Gun-House. — Colonnade Row. — Massachusetts Med- 
ical College. — Haymarket Theatre. — Boylston Street. — Jolm Quincy 
Adams. — General Moreau. — Charles Francis Adams. 

UPOX the pavement of Tremont Street once more, Ave renew 
our \yanderings in the vicinity of the Okl Granary Bury- 
ing-Ground. Common Street was the first distinctive appella- 
tion received by that part of Tremont from School Street to 
Boylston, or, to copy the language of the record, " from ^lelyne's 
corner, near Colonel Townsend's, passing through the Common, 
along by Mr. Sheef's into Frog Lane." It did not become 
Tremont Street until 1829. The name of Long Acre was given 
to that part of the street between School and AVinter by Adino 
Paddock, of whom something anon. He came from tliat part 
of London in which the great plague originated, and which was 
noted for its mughouses. In London Long Acre is tlie scene 
of Matt Prior's amours, when, after an evening witli Swift, 
Oxford, Bolingbroke, and Pope, he would go and smoke a i)ipe 
and drink a bottle of beer with a common soldier. This name 
of Paddock's was generally accepted, thougli we do not learn 
that it ever had any official sanction. 

Tlie Tremont House, though not an old landmark, is a pn^m- 
inent one. The corner-stone was laid on the 4th of July, 182S, 
and it was opened to the i)ublic October 16, 1829. Isaiah 
13 8 



290 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Eogers was the architect. It was thought to be, and was at 
this time, a model of kixury and elegance. It has seen some 
notable guests. Henry Clay, or, more familiarly, Harry of the 
West, tarried here. So did his antagonist, then President, 
Jackson, on his visit to Boston in June, 1833. These two men 
gave rise to two party watchwords which have been perpetuated 
in a singular manner. Two rival political bands of Kentuckians 
went to settle on the banks of the Missouri. One party came 
from the Blue-Grass region, and were Clay men. The other 
was from the Big Sandy, and were Jackson men. The battle- 
cry of the parties was, "Clay and Liberty," "Jackson and 
Independence." Each little band of settlers named their vil- 
lages for their war-cry, and eventually the counties for their 
political chiefs. So they now remain. 

Brave Hull came also to see the docking of his old ship, the 
Constitution. Charles Dickens, on his first visit to America, 
came to the Tremont House. It took him eighteen days to 
come over in the Britannia. It is said the first person he asked 
for on his arrival was Bryant ; but, as the steamer reached her 
dock after dark, we may conclude the comforts of his hotel 
engrossed the novelist's mind. He gives a somewhat humorous 
account of his initiation into American hotel customs : — 

" ' Dimier, if you please,' said I to the waiter. 

" ' When ? ' said the waiter. 

" ' As quick as possible/ said I. 

" ' Right away i ' said the waiter. 

" After a moment's hesitation, I answered ' No,' at hazard. 

" ' Not right away ? ' cried the waiter, with an amount of surprise 
that made me start. 

" I looked at him doubtfully, and returned, ' No ; I would rather 
have it in this private room. I like it very much.' 

" At this, I really thought the waiter must have gone out of his 
mind ; as I believe he would have done, but for the interposition of 
another man who whispered in his ear, ' Directly.' 

" ' Well ! and that 's a fact ! ' said the waiter, looking helplessly at 
me. ' Right away.' 

" I now saw that * right away ' and ' directly ' were one and the 
same thing. So I reversed my previous answer, and sat down to 
dinner in ten minutes afterwards, and a capital dinner it was. 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 291 

'•The hotel (a very excellent one) is called the Treniont House. 
It has more galleries, colonnades, piazzas, and passages than I can 
remember, or the reader would believe." 

Lieutenant Derby, better known as Johu Phoenix, humor- 
ously reviews the prospect of the burial-ground from the 
windows, which he considered, not Avithout some degree of 
plausibility, part and parcel of all Boston hotels. Derby was 
a very clever artist, and used to draw comic caricatures on the 
blackboard of Jones's in San Francisco. This was before the 
merchants had an exchange there, and Phrenix was accustomed 
to put himself mider the head of ship arrivals, instead of regis- 
tering his name at the office. 

The little garden beyond the hotel, and next the cemetery, 
was once a house-lot, on wliich stood a modest little brick 
dwelling, built by a Mr. Ne^vman. The hotel displaced three 
ante-Pevolutionary houses : one, fronting Beacon Street, was 
the residence of John Parker ; the corner of Tremont was an 
open lot, with handsome horse-chestnut trees, belonging to an 
old-fashioned house with the end to the street, the mansion of 
the Hubbard family. Next was a house built by Tliomas Per- 
kins, whose wife was a ]\Iascarene. It fronted on the street, 
and had a garden. 

The old Tremont Theatre stood on the spot now covered by 
the Tremont Temple. The corner-stone was laid on the morn- 
ing of July 4, 1827. The theatre was built so rapidly that a 
performance took place on the 24th of September. " Wives as 
they Were, and Maids as they Are," was the piece chosen by 
:Mr. Pelby. Ostinelli, the father of the since famous Eliza 
Biscaccianti, led the orchestra. W. K. Blake read the prize 
address, — the same eminent comedian so long connected with 
the New York theatres. 

Mr. Pelby was the prime mover in the project to erect another 
theatre, which had professedly for its object the elevation of the 
character of the Boston stage. But little opposition was en- 
countered from the Boston Theatre proprietors. A company 
was organized in February, and the work presseil to early com- 
pletion. We give the cast for the opening night ; — 



292 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

TREMONT THEATRE. 

The public is respectfully informed that the Tremont Tlieatre 

Will open 

On Monday Evening, Se]Dtember 24. 

jg®^ The Orchestra will embrace the most distinguished musical talent in the 

country. Leader Mr. Ostinelli. 

There will be presented Mrs. Inchbald's Comedy, called 
WIVES AS THEY WERE, AND MAIDS AS THEY ARE. 
Lord Priory, Mr. Herbert. 

Sir William Dorillon, Mr. Webb. 

Sir George Evelyn, Mr, Reed. 

Mr. Browzly, Mr. Blake. 

Mr. Norberry, Mr. Forbes. 

Oliver, Mr. J. Mills Brown. 

Miss Dorillon, Mrs. Blake. 

Lady Mary Raffle, Mrs. Young. 

Lady Priory, Mrs. Pelby. 

Previous to the Comedy, the Prize address will be delivered by Mr. Blake. 
The entertainment to conclude with the Farce of the 
LADY AND THE DEVIL. 

The elder Booth succeeded Pelby in the management of the 
second season, but withdrew before it ended. Wilson and 
Eussell successively conducted, the latter bringing out the cele- 
brated Master Burke, who produced an unparalleled excitement. 
Tor twenty-five nights he filled the house with fashionable au- 
diences.. Messrs. Barrett and Barry were subsequent managers. 

The Tremont always maintained a high standing, though its 
patronage fell off in later years. It is noticeable as the first 
Boston house in which operas were produced. Many sterling 
actors have appeared here, among whom the veteran John 
Gilbert and wife still hold a high place in general esteem. 
Finn played here, investing his parts with a quaint fine humor 
that seldom failed to set the house in a roar. In 1842 the 
Tremont ceased to be a theatre, having been sold to the Baptist 
Society of Eev. Dr. Colver. The interior was remodelled, and 
received the name of the Tremont Temple. The present build- 
ing is the second, the first having been destroyed by fire on 
Wednesday, March 31, 1852. The falling walls crushed and 
bruised a number of persons. 

The Theatre was a plain substantial edifice with granite front, 



A TOUR KOUND THE COMMON. 293 

in imitation of the Ionic, ^vith pillars supporting an enta})la- 
ture and pediment. The entrance doors were arched, opening 
into a wide hall from which ascended a staircase to the boxes 
of the dress circle. There were lobbies for promenade, with- 
drawing-rooms, and a pretty saloon in the centre. l.saiah 
liogers was the architect. The house had a thiixl tier and pit. 
It was sold for about $ 55,000. 

Eliliu Burritt, the learned blacksmith, lectured in the tlu-atre 
before its alteration, for the benefit of the Church Society. 
Under the auspices of the Mercantile Library Association, 
"Webster, Choate, and Everett have delivered addresses in the 
Temple, while Jenny Lind and Catherine Hays have here 
jioured forth their golden notes to enraptured audiences. Here, 
too, Gliddon unrolled his mummy in presence of astonished 
spectators, and set the medical fraternity in a fever of ex- 
citement. Last, but not least, came Charles Dickens, to in- 
terpret his own incomparable works. 

In the building adjoining the Temple are the quarters of the 
Independent CadetSj-^ihe oldest military organization, next to 
the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company, in Boston. This 
corps was instituted in 1786, but existed prior to that tune. 
It was first styled the Governor's Foot Guards. The comman- 
ders had the rank of lieutenant-colonel. Leonard Jarvis was 
the commander in 1768, and John Hancock was ele('t«'d in 







The Boston Gazette of May 12, 1772, contains the following 
advertisement : — 

" "Wanted, Immcdiatebj, For His Excellency's Company of CatU'ts, 
Two Fifers that understand Playing. Those that are Mastei-s of 
Musiek, and are inclined to engage with the Company, are dcsiretl 
to apply to Col. John Hancock." 

The company received General Gage wlien lie lanih-d at 
Long WHiarf, in May, 1774, and escorte<l him to the Coiut 
House and thence to the Province House, his residi'ucc. The 
general had caused a beautiful silk standard with his arms em- 
broidered thereon to be made in London, and jtresented to the 
Cadets. Becoming, however, jealous and suspicious of Hancock, 



294 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

the governor revoked his commission through Thomas Flucker, 
his secretary, upon which the corps disbanded, and through a 
committee returned the standard to Gage at Dan vers. 

In 1778 the Cadets were redivivi, being then commanded 
by Colonel Hichborn. In that year they took part in the ex- 
pedition to Ehode Island, as did also the Light Infantry Com- 
pany. Hancock, their old commander, was now major-general, 
and accompanied them. The first parade of the Cadets after 
the peace was in 1785. Colonel T. H. Perkins commanded in 
1789. 

Bromfield Street was named, in 1796, for Honorable Edward 
Bromfield, a distinguished merchant, whose mansion stood on 
the site of the Bromfield House. Previously it was Eawson's 
Lane; it continued to be called Bromfield's Lane until 1829. 

The Horticultural Building stands on the site of the old 
Museum. Montgomery Place is of modern origin. Bumstead 
Place, once the abode of Adino Paddock, coach and chariot 
builder for the gentry of Boston and the country round, has 
been sealed by a soHd wall of buildings, saving only the en- 
trance to Music Hall. Paddock was a hot tory, and left Bos- 
ton with the royal party. His estate, it is said, fell into the 
hands of Bumstead, a coach-maker like himself, from whom 
the place took its name. 

Paddock is entitled to grateful remembrance for the noble 
English elms he planted opposite his habitation, known as 
Paddock's Mall. The year 1762 has been assigned as the 
probable period of their setting out, consequently they have 
stood considerably more than a hundred years, though they 
now show symptoms of decay. The trees came from England. 
They were kept for a time in a nursery at Milton, until placed 
here by Paddock, assisted by John Ballard and John Crane ; 
the latter a member of Paddock's train of artillery. " Pad- 
dock's Walk " and " Row " are other names by which the maU 
has been called. 

These trees have been subject to many vicissitudes. Three 
of them have been removed and eleven are left standing. 
Mutilation has done its work upon them. The storms of a 



A TOUR KOrXD THE COMMON. 295 

century liave wreiiclR'd their branches, until the naked trunks 
are scarce concealed in the scanty foliage. The great gale of 
1815 did them nnich damage. Some injury was dune to the 
growing trees during the rejoicings over the repeal of the Stamp 
Act. The British troops, perhaps out of sympathy with their 
tory adherent, did them no harm, though the trees of tlie great 
mall Avere less respected. lUit the greatest enemy to the exist- 
ence of the trees is found in the spirit of improvement, which 
seeks to make a modern city out of Old Boston. An abortive 
effort to have them removed was made in 18G0; and again, 
while we write, they are marked for destruction. 

"Woodman, spare that tree! 

Touch not a single bough ! 
In youth it sheltered me, 

And I '11 protect it now. 
'T was my forefather's hand 

That placed it near his cot ; 
There, woodman, let it stand, 

Thy axe shall harm it not." 

Paddock was, in 1774, captain of the train of artillery be- 
longing to the Boston Eegiment, of which John Erving was 
colonel. This com2)any was particularly distinguished for its 
superior discipline and the excellence of its material. In this 
school were raised two artillery olficers of high repute in the 
Revolutionary army, namely. Colonel John Crane and Ceneral 
Ebenezer Stevens. Both were housewrights, and tlie company 
was itself composed of mechanics. The two ollicers named are 
not the only ones who gained distinction in the battle-lields of 
the old war. Paddock, on his return to England, was fre<pUMit]y 
consulted by the ministry about American allairs, and received 
the military command of the island of Jersey. In 1701) Pad- 
dock was one of the fire wards of the town of Boston, lussociated 
witli Jolm Hancock, Samuel Adams, Thomas Dawes, and otliers. 

Ceorge Cabot, a prominent leader of the Massachusetts Fed- 
eralists, lived in the first house in Bumstead Place in IS 10. 
He was in early life like the old navigators, his nanu'sakes. a 
sailor, and became a very successful merdiaut ; was ])nsid('nt 
of the United States Branch Bank in the year mentioned, liav- 



296 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

ing a conceded reputation as a financier. While in the United 
States Senate in 1791 -96, Hamilton, the founder of our finan- 
cial system, often conferred with him. Mr. Cabot incurred 
great odium for his connection with the Hartford Convention 
in 1814, of which body he was president. Aaron Burr said 
of him when in the Senate, that " he never spoke but light fol- 
lowed him." 

Granary Burial-Ground is notable for the honored ashes 
it contains. It dates back to 1660, and was first called the 
" South Burying- Ground " ; the subsequent name of " Granary " 
was from the town granary, which stood within the enclosure. 
It is necessary to say here that the Common originally extended 
in this direction to the Tremont House, and the cemetery is 
formed from its ancient territory. The eastern margin reached 
to Mason Street, and Tremont Street therefore runs through 
the Common, as it originally was. After the creation of the 
Common Burying-Ground, the Granary was sometimes styled 
the " Middle " Ground. 

" I like that ancient Saxon phrase which calls 
The burial-ground God's Acre ! It is just ; 
It consecrates each grave within its walls, 
And breathes a benison o'er the sleeping dust." 

The Checkleys, Byfields, Lydes, Faneuils, Wendells, and a 
host of the old Bostonians, Governors Bellingham, Dummer, 
Hancock, Adams, Bowdoin, Gushing, Sullivan, Eustis, and 
Sumner lie beneath the sod in this cemetery. The celebrated 
surgeon. Dr. John Jeffries, Uriah Cotting, Eev. Messrs. Eckley, 
Belknap, Stillman, Lathrop, and Baldwin, and Judge Sewall 
and John Hull, are alSo entombed here. 

The Bellingham family becoming extinct, his tomb was 
given to the family of Governor James Sullivan. It lies on 
the west side of the enclosure. Tlie Faneuil inscription was 
chiselled Funal by some awkward hand, who thus clipped the 
old Huguenot patronymic of its due proportions. Governor 
Hancock's tomb is on the Park Street side. His remains, after 
lying eight days in state, were brought to their last resting- 
place by an immense concourse of people. The venerable 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 



297 



Samuel Adams followed the bier until fatigue compellod him 
to retire. It was one of the greatest funeral pageants liustcjn 
had seen. The ranks of the procession were swelled hy the 




GRANARY BIRVING-GROUND. 

militia of town and country. The Judges of the Supreme 
Court on this occasion made their last appearance in tlu'ir big 
wigs and bhick silk gowns. They were followed by the barris- 
ters in black gowns and club wigs. 

General Warren's remains were placed in tlie tomb of tho 
jMinots, next to that of Hancock, and immediately in rear of 
the residence of Dr. J. C. Warren, after they were exhumed at 
Bunker Hill. 

The cemetery acquires an even greater interest from being 
the place where the victims of the Boston ISIassacre were buri.-d. 
Their funeral Avas conducted with great pomp ; but although 
their martyrdom has been heralded as the foundation-stone of 
American Liberty, the remains of the slaughtered r>ost(.nians 
13* 



298 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

have received no fitting testimonial from their countrymen. 
The spot was long indicated by a larch-tree, but this, falling to 
decay, has been recently replaced by the care of Mr. Appollonio. 

The Franklin cenotaph stands out in bold relief in the midst 
of the field of the dead. Under it repose the dust of both of 
Franklin's parents. The monument was erected through the 
exertions of a few citizens in 1827, and the ceremony of laying 
the corner-stone was attended by the governor, lieutenant-gov- 
ernor, and many other officials. General H. A. S. Dearborn 
delivered an address ; some Franklin School medals were appro- 
priately placed underneath. 

By the year 1738 both this and King's Chapel ground be- 
came so filled with the dead that the grave-diggers were obliged 
to bury them four deep. In this year the brick wall and tombs 
were erected on tlie front of the old, or Chapel, burying-place. 
The Granary ground was enlarged in 1716-17 by taking in 
part of the highway on the easterly side, but in about twenty 
years it became overcrowded, as we have seen, and the town 
began to cast about for a new location. It was not until after 
the date last mentioned that any tombs were erected here. 

Where was there ever a graveyard without its attendant hor- 
rors ] Tradition is responsible for the statement that the hand 
of Hancock was severed from the arm the night after his inter- 
ment ; but this proved a cruel invention. An instance is given 
of an empty tomb being taken possession of by some wandering 
vagrants, from which they terrified the neighborhood by the 
sound of midnight revelry. Human jackals have practised 
here their hateful calling, robbing the graves of their peaceful 
inhabitants. 

The stone wall and fence were erected under the administra- 
tion of Mayor Armstrong. It is now proposed to carry a new 
avenue across the cemetery. This being done, the remains of 
the greatest and most honored of our ancestors will be scattered 
far and near. 

" Imperial Cassar, dead, and tiirned to clay, 
Might stop a hole to keep the wind away." 

Next the burial-ground stood the Old Granary. It was a 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 299 

long wooden building, crecti'd lirst at the upper side of the Com- 
mon, but removed about 1737 to the present site of the church. 
It was established so as to have a supply of grain, especially 
in cases of scarcity, where the poor might purchase the smallest 
quantities at a small advance on the cost. The building con- 
tained, when full, twelve thousand bushels, and was the largest 
in the town. The selectmen appointed a keeper at their March 
meeting, also a committee for the purchase of grain. John 
Fenno, a noted wit, Avas keeper before the Ilevohition. It was 
not used as a granary after the American war, but was occupieil 
by various minor town officials. In 1795 the town voted to 
sell the building, on condition of an early removal. Still it 
remained tenanted by various tradesmen, refreshment stands, 
etc., until 1809, when it was removed to Commercial Point, 
Dorchester, and altered into a hotel. There it may now be 
seen. AVe have noticed that the Constitution's sails were made 
in the Granary. 

All the land upon which Park Street is built belonged to the 
Common, and was at an early day appropriated to uses of the 
town for various institutions. The street was first called Centry 
Street, from its leading u^) to Centry Hill, as the summit of 
Beacon Hill was called. 

The Almshouse was first erected on Beacon Street, in 1 GG2. 
It was burnt in 1G82, measures being then taken to rebuild it. 
The reconstructed building was a two-story brick, with a gable 
roof, fronting on Beacon Street ; it was of an L shape. This 
was designed as a home for the poor, aged, or infirm. It w;i3 
soon found that the mingling under the same roof i)f ]>erson3 
deserving charity with those confined for offences against tho 
laws was an evil demanding a remedy, anel measures wero 
taken, in 1712, to build a Bridewell, or House of Correction. 
This was erected in Park Street, in what year does not appear, 
but it is shown on the map of 1722. A part of this house was 
applied to the use of the insane. 

A Workhouse was erected in 1738, contiguous to the Bride- 
well. It was a large, handsome brick building, facing the 
Common, of two stories, gable roof, and was a hundred antl 



300 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

twenty feet in length. This building was devoted to the con- 
finement of minor offenders, such as the j^rovince law styled 
" rogues and vagabonds." 

The Ahnshouse became, in the lapse of years, totally inade- 
quate to its purposes. It had no proper ventilation, nor sepa- 
rate hospital for the treatment of the sick ; bad air, filth, and 
overcrowding told fearfully upon the inmates. I^o remedy was 
applied to these evils until 1801, when a new building was 
erected in Leverett Street. During the Eevolutionary War the 
inmates frequently suffered for the necessaries of life, and appear 
to have been at all times largely dependent on the charity of 
the townspeople. In 1795 the town sold all its property on 
Park and Beacon Streets, except the Granary or church lot. 

•Both Almshouse and Workhouse were under the government 
of the overseers of the poor, represented by keepers. The 
inmates of the former, whatever may have been their temporal 
needs, were cared for sj^iritually, a sermon being preached to 
them every Sunday in summer. Captain Keayne, in 1656, left 
a legacy of £ 120, and Mr. Webb, in 1660, one of £ 100, for 
the founding of the Almshouse, which was received and applied 
by the town in 1662. The former also left a smn to be used 
in building a granary. Both Workhouse and Almshouse were 
occupied by the British wounded after Bunker Hill. 

Adjoining the BrideweU was the Pound, situated where the 
Quincy residence now is. Such were the antecedents of Park 
and Beacon Streets. 

For a long time the handsome spire of Park Street Church 
was the highest object seen on approaching the city. It, how- 
ever, succumbed to its neighbor in Somerset Street, placed at a 
greater altitude. As one of the monuments of the Common it 
is inseparable from the landscape, the slender, graceful steeply 
rising majestically above the tree-tops from any point of obser- 
vation. The little monitor of the weather on its pinnacle 
recalls the lines of Albert G. Greene : — 

" The dawn has broke, the mom is up, 
Another day begun ; 
And there thy poised and gikled spear 
Is flashing in the sun, 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 301 

Upon tliat steeji and lofty tower, 

Where thou thy watch liast kept, 
A true and faithful sentinel, 

Wliile all around thee slept." 

The church was erected in 1809, and was the first Congrega- 
tional Society constituted since 1748. From the fervor of the 
doctrines i^reaclied within its walls, its site has been known as 
"Brimstone Corner," — a name too suggestive to be agreeable. 




PARK STREKT 



Edward D. (Iriffin, D. D., was tlie first pastor. Pwight, Imm-cIkt, 
Stone, and other gifted preacliers liave occupied its j)idpit. 
Underneath were vaults — long since removed — for the dead. 
Peter Banner, an Englisli architect, the same who made the plan 
f.)r the fine old mansion-house of Eben Crafts in Ivoxbury, de- 
signed this church. 

The Manufactory House of the old colony times stood on the 
east side of what is Hamilton Place. The west end fronted 
Long Acre, or Tremont Street, and had delmeated upon the 



302 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 




LINEN SPINNING-WHEEL. 



wall a female figure, distaff in hand, symbolic of the industry- 
it was intended to promote. 

The establishment of spinning-schools is an interesting inci- 
dent in the history of Boston. The 
manufacture of cotton had begun as 
early as 1643, the raw material being 
obtained from the West Indies. In 
1665, owing to the scarcity of cloth, 
the court ordered spinning to be' em- 
ployed in private families, some abate- 
ment from the rates being made as 
compensation. 

About 1718a number of colonists 
arrived from Londonderry, bringing 
with them the manufacture of linen and the implements used 
in Ireland. The matter was earnestly taken up by the Bosto- 
nians, and a vote passed to establish a spinning-school on the 
waste land in front of Captain Southack's, t- about Avhere Scol- 
lay's buildings were. These emigrants likewise introduced the 
general use of their favorite vegetable, the potato. 

From these beginnings dates the establishment of the Manu- 
factory House by the province. William Phillips, INIolineux, 
and others carried the measure through the General Court. An 
excise was laid on carriages and 
articles of luxury to erect the build- 
ing. Spinning now became the 
order of the day. Young and old, 
rich and poor, repaired to the Com- 
mon with their spinning-wheels, 
great and small, stimulated by a 
premium offered to the most skilful. 
Many were clad in garments of their 
own manufacture as evidence of 
their industry, and on the appointed 
days the mall resounded with the 
hum of busy wheels. The novelty soon wore off, and after 
tliree or four years the manufacture wholly ceased. For a short 




WOOLLEN SPINNING-WHEEL. 



A TOUR KOUXD THE COMMON. 303 

time aftonvards it was used for tlie manufacture of worsted 
liose, metal buttons, etc., but in 17G8 was rented by the prov- 
ince and occupied by private families. 

At tliis time it acquired celebrity from the attempt made by 
Colonel Dalrymple, of the.l4tli royal regulars, to obtain it for 
quarters for his regiment ; but the tenants, with ^Ir. Elisha 
Brown at their head, flatly refused them admission. Governor 
Bernard issued his mandate, which was served by the sheriff, 
ordering the surrender of the premises ; but the doors were 
securely closed, and Brown boldly denied the right of Bernard 
to dispossess him. The wily lieutenant-governor tried next to 
induce the tenants to open, but with no greater success, and at 
last a stratagem was tried. The sheriff and his deputies ob- 
tained an entrance to the cellar, but instead of securing the 
obstinate tenant, Avere by him made close prisoners in the 
cellar, where they remained until a file of soldiers from the Com- 
mon came and released them. 

Thus did Elisha Brown make good his resistance against the 
combined civil and military authority of the province, after 
enduring a state of siege for several weeks. A gravestone in 
the Granary commemorates his gallant vindication of private 
rights. Dalrymple's men were quartered in Faneuil Hall. 

The ^Massachusetts Bank was first located in this building. 
It was instituted in 1784, in which year the 1)ank became a 
purchaser of the building, sold by order of the General Court. 
Banking was a very different affair in those days from wliat it 
is at present. Articles of merchandise were received as security 
for loans, and an entertaining picture might be drawn of the 
procession drawn up before the doors on discount days. One 
half per cent per month was the rate demanded, and no credit 
could exceed sixty days. Governor Bowdoin was the first 
president. 

The building was of two stories, of brick, with an entrance on 
Hamilton "Place by a flight of doultle stone steps jiroteetcd by an 
iron railing. It was used by the British during the occuj)ation, 
and received its quota of the wounded from Bunker Hill. 
Various families occupied it in after years ; also P. A. von 



304 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Hagen, a pioneer in the manufacture of pianofortes. In 1806 
it was pulled clown, and Hamilton Place then built. The 
Manufactory House was one hundred and forty, feet long, with 
an unobstructed southerly view in 1784. It had a large hall 
in the centre, with wings fifty feet long extending upon either 
side ; underneath was an excellent cellar, the same in which 
Sheriff Greenleaf sojourned. The central part was occupied by 
the bank, giving twenty other apartments for tenants. The 
land belonging to it covered the whole place. 

At the corner of Hamilton Place Messrs. J. E. Osgood and 
Company continue the publication of the leading ]Deriodical of 
the country. The originator of the North American Review 
was William Tudor, son of Hon. Judge Tudor, and one of the 
founders of the Anthology Club. The first four volumes of 
the Review, which was first jDublished in 1811, are said to be 
almost entirely from his hand ; the first number, even to the 
literary notices, was, as Mr. Tudor himself stated, wholly writ- 
ten by him. Mr. Tudor, as the agent of his brother Frederick, 
established in 1805 the traffic in ice with the West Indies, 
which has grown to such prodigious proportions. He was also 
the first to draw public attention to the erection of a monument 
on Bunker Hill, but did not live to see its completion. 

As we are trenching on the limits of Long Acre, a Revolu- 
tionary incident rises into view. Here, on the morning of the 
19th of April, Earl Percy ranged his columns for the march to 
Lexington. Colonel Smith had sent a courier requesting rein- 
forcements, and Percy was to command them. His brigade, 
made up of eight companies of three regiments of infantry, 
the 4th, 23d, and 49th, detachments of Pitcairn's marines, 
and two pieces of artillery, extended from the head of the mall 
to Court Street, opposite the school-house of Master Carter. 
Percy, mounted on a white horse, galloped up and down his 
ranks. The school, thrown into a ferment by the unusual 
spectacle, was dismissed by the master with the speech, — 
" Boys, war has begun ; the school is broken up." 

The column took up its march over the Neck to the tune of 
Yankee Doodle. Percy seems to have stood high in the confi- 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 305 

dence of his general, and, in fact, lie appears to have boon a 
universal favorite. The return from the niarcli in wliich the 
provincials 

** Taught Percy fashionable races, 
And modern modes of Chevy-chaces," 

is celebrated in the Eevolutionary ballad in this wise : — 

" Lord Piercy seemed to snore, — but may the muse 
This ill-timed snoring to the jieer excuse. 
Tired was the long boy of his toilsome day ; 
Full tifteeu miles he tied, — a tedious way ; 
How should he then the dews of Somnus shun, 
Perhaps not used to walk, much less to run." 

The Common is now, as under the government of John Win- 
tlirop, the common land of the inhabitants of Boston. Its 
original purpose was for pasturage and military parade. From 
the earliest times until after Boston became a city, the tinkling 
of bells and lowing of cattle might be heard across its hills and 
dales. It was, after its purchase from Blackstone, preserved 
from encroachment by a vote passed March 30, 16-40 : — 

" Ordered, that no more land be granted in the Town out of the 
open ground or common field, which is between Gentry Hill and 
Mr. C()ll)rou's end, except 3 or 4 lots to make vp the street from 
Bro. Robt. Walker's to the Round IVIarsh." 

Colbron's field was at the lower end of the Common, lying 
along Pleasant Street and the water, to Washington Street. It 
was lioylston Street that the selectmen had in view. 

No other city in America has fifty acres of green turf and 
noble forest trees in its very midst. Its central position renders 
it accessible from every quarter of the town, and, althongli it is 
not dignified with the name of a park, it is at onro tlio glory 
and beauty of the ancient peninsula. We shall lake up its 
features as we pass along under the green arches of the (Jreat 
i\Iall. 

Upon the earliest map you will see but three trees on the 
Common. These were the monarch, then and still known as 
the *' great tree," and two of respectable size standing near the 
middle of Park Street. The first trees planted were tho outer 
row on Tremont Street, between 1722 and 1729. A second 

T 



306 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

row was placed there in 1734, and the third was added fifty 
years later, — some authorities say before the Revolution. This 
walk was long known as "The Mall," there being no other 
within the Common, until that next Beacon Street was laid out 
in 1815-16. Charles Street was the next laid out, in 1823 ; 
and Park Street Mall, in 1826, under the elder Quincy's may- 
oralty. 

It has been stated, on the authority of the son of one of 
those employed, that the first trees of the Great Mall, set out 
near the Park Street Church, were planted by the apprentices 
of Adam Colson the elder, then one of the selectmen of the 
town. One of the apprentices was named Hurd. Colson 
was a leather-dresser, and lived in Frog Lane, now Boylston 
Street. 

But the Great Mall was not at the beginning of this century, 
as now, a grove of near a third of a mile in length. The 
large trees scarcely extended below West Street, those beyond 
being merely saplings. That part of the Common forming the 
southeast corner, comprising a little more than two acres, and 
lying east of the burying-ground, was not acquired until 1787, 
when it was purchased of William Poster, whose mansion stood 
where now the Hotel Pelham is. The tract acquired was known 
as Foster's Pasture. 

The British soldiers, with a truly vandal spirit, cut down 
several of the largest trees in the mall the morning they evac- 
uated the town. A large number had before been sacrificed to 
provide fuel, but this was the act of malice alone. The surface 
of the Common was greatly disfigured by cellars and ditches 
dug throughout the camps, traces of which long remained 
visible, even to the circles made by the tents. General Howe 
stayed the destruction of the trees of the mall at the solicita- 
tion of the selectmen. 

Before the Eevolution there was a wooden fence, but this, 
too, was used for fuel, and the Common lay open until after the 
peace, when it was rebuilt by a subscription set on foot by Dr. 
Oliver Smith. The iron fence was erected in 1836, at a cost 
of $82,500. Its length is 1,932 yards, — rather more than a 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 307 

mile. In 1733, when the town voted to plant a second row of 
trees at a suitable distance from those ah-eady set out, the 
selectmen were directed to set up a row of posts with a rail on 
the top of them, extending from the Granary L>urying-G round 
to Colonel Fitche's, leaving openings at tlie several streets and 
lanes. In 1739 a similar fence was ordered from Common 
Street to Beacon. 

The Common appears to have been first called " Centry 
Field," taking this name from the hill on whose slope it lay, 
which later received the name of Beacon Hill. Century Field 
is another instance of the quaint orthography, of which the 
records furnish abundant specimens. It ai)pears to have been 
indifferently called the "Training Field" and "Centry Field" 
for a long time. 

Turning once more to the street, we pause at the entrance of 
the Music Hall. There was, in 1768, a hall of this name in 
Brattle Street, opposite the meeting-house. A concert was ad- 
vertised to be given November 21, 1768, to be followed by a 
ball. Tickets twenty shillings, lawful money. 

On the corner of Winter Street once stood an old a nto-IJ evo- 
lutionary house, with a fine garden, in which, it is said, Oovernor 
Bernard at one time made his town residence. It became a 
famous boarding-house under the successive aus])ices of ^Frs. 
Hatch and Mrs. Dexter. Governor Strong, when in town 
during his second term, resided with Mrs. Hatch. 

The following toast was published in 1817, as having b.'on 
given at the celebration by the blacks in Boston of tiu; anni- 
versary of the abolition of the slave-trade : — 

" Governur Brouks, may the mantelpiece of Caleb Strong fall Mjxtn 
the lied of his distinguished predecessor.'* 

John McLean, the eminent merchant, founder of th»> McLean 
Asylum, boarded with ]\[rs. Dexter. His finan<'ial reverses are 
well known. It is related of him that he one day a.ssembled 
his creditors at a dinner, where each found under his jdate a 
check for the full amount due him. This was after he had been 
legally released from his obligations. 



308 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON.' 

Among the names bestowed upon this busy mart of fashion 
was Blott's Lane, from Robert Blott ; also Bannister's and Wil- 
lis's Lane. 

Winter Street once boasted a resident so influential in the 
cause of liberty as to receive the distinction of outlawry from 
George III. The offences of Samuel Adams and John Hancock 
were too flagitious to admit of pardon. The house of Samuel 
Adams stood on the south side of Winter Street, on the corner 
of Winter Place. It was a two-story wooden house, fronting on 
the street ; at the back was an L, and in the rear a small gar- 
den. The building was standing as late as 1820, and, while it re- 
mained, was not the least interesting object to be seen in Boston. 
Samuel Adams was a Boston boy. Born in 1722, he had 
seen the administrations of the royal governors from Burnet to 
Gage. He took his degree at eighteen at Harvard, and after 
trying unsuccessfully a merchant's career, devoted himself to 
literature, until called to a political life. First a tax-gatherer, 
then a representative, his influence begins to appear at the com- 
mencement of the Stamp Act difficulties. After the Massacre, 
he overbore the flimsy objections of Hutchinson to a removal 
of the troops from the town by a manly, bold, and unanswer- 
able argument. 

In later times, in all the movements of the people of Boston 
preceding actual hostilities, Samuel Adams was the admitted 
power behind the throne. Warren was brave, Hancock rich, 
and Adams sagacious. It was remarked of Hancock that he 
paid the postage, while Adams did the writing. Lord North, 
when informed that Hutchinson had yielded to the demand of 
the chairman of the town committee, called the regulars " Sam 
Adams's two regiments," in contempt. The Ministry styled 
him " Chief of the Revolution." 

Mr. Jefferson's opinion of Samuel Adams is a concise and 
deserved tribute to the patriot. Says the sage of 'Monticello, 
'' I can say that he was truly a great man, — wise in council, 
fertile in resources, immovable in his purposes, — and had, I 
think, a greater share than any other member in advising and 
directing our measures in the Northern war." 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. IJO'J 

When Adams, a fugitive with Hancock, heard the liring on 
Lexington Common, he exulted, knowing that the day of hu- 
miHation was passing forever away. The sword was now to 
decide the contest, and Adams labored without intermission in 
the councils of the incipient nation. He was an active member 
of tlie Congress of 1774; and he drew up, with John Adams, 
the draft of the State Constitution. A member of the con- 
vention to consider the Federal Constitution, he was not at 
first in favor of its adoption, but acceded to the i)lan of 
Hancock to ratify the instrument and propose amendments to 
it in accord with the views of Massachusetts statesmen. Ho 
was lieutenant-governor under Hancock, and followed him to 
his last resting-place. From 1794 to 1797 the venerable Sam- 
uel Adams governed the State. He died in 1803, an octoge- 
narian. 

It is related by Waterhouse that the two Adamses, John and 
Samuel, were one day walking in the mall we have just bi-un 
describing. As they came oj)i)osite the noble mansion of Han- 
cock the latter remarked, with emphasis, " I have done a very 
good thing for our cause, in the course of the past week, by en- 
listing the master of that house into it. He is well disposed, 
and has great riches, and we can give him cousecpience to enjoy 
them." 

Samuel Adams was of ordinary height, muscular form, and 
had light complexion and light blue eyes. He wore a red 
cloak, a gray tie-wig, and cocked hat. In person ho was vciy 
erect. His father was a brewer, and his son Samuel succeeded 
to his business. Admiral Coffin used to relate that hr had rar- 
ried malt on his back from Adams's brewery. 

The old estate on Purchase Street, where Adams was ]).)rn, 
was only about sixty feet north of Summer. It faced the 
harbor, commanding a fine view, and was conspicuous among 
the few buildings contemi)orary with it. On tlie roof was an ol)- 
servatory and a railing, witli steps leading u}) from the outside. 
It was improved in 1730, and the grounds wcn^ still adorn.-.l 
with trees and shrubbery as late as 1800.* Tliis was the estate 
* Wells's Life of Samuel Adams, 



310 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



preserved by Samuel Adams after his father's unsuccessful 
speculation in the Land Bank scheme. 

Other statesmen and soldiers famous in the pages of history 
have walked in the old mall. We have no doubt that Wash- 
ington and Winslow, Loudon, Amherst, and Hood, Gage, Clin- 
ton, Burgoyne, and Howe, have all sought its leafy shades. 
Talleyrand, Moreau, Louis Philippe, and Lafayette have doubt- 
less paced within its cool retreats, and meditated upon the fate 
of empires they were to build or overtlirow. Silas Deane, 
Pulaski, Gates, and Greene have certainly trod this famous walk. 

St. Paul's, overshadowed and overtopped as it is by its feudal- 
looking neighbor, has yet some points of attraction. It was 




ST. PAULS CTITTRCII AND MASONIC TEMPLE. 



designed by Captain Alexander Parris, though, it is said, Wih 
lard drew some of the working plans, and superintended the 
stone-work, cutting some of the ca})itals with his own hand in 
the adjoining gardens. The front is unfinished, and the general 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMOX. 311 

aspect of the building did not satisfy the expectation for a 
model of ancient art. The pediment was intended to 1)l', orna- 
mented with bas-reliefs representing Paul l)efore Agrippa, which 
would have added to the beauty of the front, but want of funds 
compelled the abandonment of this design. The main building 
is of gray gi'anite, once white, but now blackened by the action 
of the elements. The portico is of sandstone from Accpiia 
Creek, tlie columns of which have been compared, not inaptly, 
to a collection of grindstones, they being composed of many 
separate sections. Taken as a whole, the appearance of 8t. 
Paid's may be styled " dark, gloomy, and peculiar." 

The erection of St. Paul's marked an era in the architecture 
of Boston churches. Hitherto the houses of worship were of 
the same general character, King's Chapel and Brattle Street 
alone excepted. The latter were the only departures from the 
stiff, and, we may add, ugly structures introduced by tin- Puri- 
tans. St. Paul's was the first specimen of the i)nrc Ionic in 
the town. 

This was the fourth Episcopal church erected in Boston ; 
consecrated June 30, 1820. Dr. Samuel F. Jarvis was the first 
rector. The interior is chaste and beautiful. The ceding is a 
cylindrical vault, Avith panels spanning the wlude widtli (tf tlm 
church. Underneath the floor are tombs. The remains of 
General Warren were deposited under St. Paul's in the tt»nd) 
of his nephew, Dr. John Q. Warren, until removed in August, 
1855, to tlie ftmnly vault at Forest Hills. 

Solomon Willard came to Boston in 1804, and first worked 
at his trade of carpenter. He was employed on tlie faiiKMis Kx- 
change Coffee House, the conflagration of which, in 1S18, was 
seen a hundred miles from Boston. He very soon ai)plied liim- 
self to the study of architecture and carving in wood. Tlie ca])- 
itals for the Brighton IMeeting-house, and those for Park StR'ct 
Church steeple, are by his hand. He also carvecl a bu.st of 
Wasliington for the sevc^nty-four-gun ship of that name, and 
executed a model of the public buildings in Wasliington for 
Mr. Bulfinch. The eagle now on the apex of (he pediment of 
the Old Custom House was carved by Mr. Willard ; it is live 



312 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

feet high, and measures the same distance from wing to wing. 
His great work was the Bunker Hill Monument, of which he 
was the architect, and he was also the discoverer of the Bunker 
Hill Quarry at Quincy. The Court House, in Court Square, 
was designed hy Mr. Willard. 

The old Masonic Temple, now used hy the United States 
courts, is huilt upon a part of the Washington Gardens. The 
corner-stone was laid in 1830, and two years elapsed hefore it 
was dedicated. The hasement and belt is of hammered granite. 
Two lofty Gothic towers, with battlements surmounted by pin- 
nacles, flank the entrance, and are a picturesque feature of the 
environs of the Great Mall. Bench and Bar now usurp the high 
places of Masonry, to which a newer and more magnificent 
temple has been dedicated. 

In the upper story of the Masonic Temple was the school of 
A. Bronson Alcott, the philosopher, and father of the popular 
authoress, Louisa May Alcott. In Mr. Alcott's school Sarah 
Margaret Fuller, afterwards Countess d'Ossoli, was an assistant 
teacher before she went to Providence, R. I., to teach. Miss 
Fuller, " the best talker since De Stael," lived with her uncle, 
Henry H. Fuller, on the north side of Avon Place (Street), 
where she held for several seasons her " Conversations " for 
young ladies. She was afterwards invited to New York, by 
Horace Greeley, as a contributor to the New York Tribune. 
The memory of her remarkable talents and literary successes 
is still fresh, and recalls the painful impression caused by her 
sad fate from shipwreck on Fire Island, when returning from 
Europe in 1850 with her husband and child. 

It is said she could compose Latin verse when only eight 
years old. Her writings, much as they were admired, were not 
equal to her conversation, in which her wonderful brilliancy 
and force of expression came forth with full power, until the 
best talkers preferred to become listeners in her society. The 
story of her life has often been told, and constitutes one of the 
brightest as well as one of the saddest pages of our history. 

The Washington Gardens .extended to the corner of West 
Street. They were surrounded by a brick wall, a part of which 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 313 

is seen in the foreground of the view of the Hay market in the 
frontispiece. A concert was announced here as early as 1815, 
by J. H. Shaffer. In 1819 an amphitheatre was erected witliin 
the grounds, wliich afterwards took the name of the Washing- 
ton Theatre. The managers of Federal Street were at first 
interested in this establishment, until it passed from their con- 
trol and became a rival. The house was adapted to the uses 
of a circus as well as for a theatre, equestrian performances 
having been given in it a number of times. As such it appears 
to have been the first in Boston. Following the Old Drury and 
Haymarket, it had an English name, being called VauxhalL 
A battalion of British troops is said to have been quartered in 
the grounds at the time of the occu2)ation, when they were 
known as Greenleaf's Gardens. 

The site of these gardens was the residence of Stephen Green- 
leaf, the old sheriff of Suffolk under the stormy administration 
of Governor Bernard. He was the same whoso exploits at the 
Manufactory House have been chronicled. The sheritf was a 
confirmed royalist, but did not join in the hegira of that i>arty 
from Boston. He died at the great age of ninety-one. After 
him it became the mansion of James Swan, who long lived in 
Paris, and was imprisoned in St. Pelagic for many years. 

The reader will obtain from the frontispiece an excellent idea 
of what the district embraced between West and Boylston 
Streets was in 1798. At the lower corner of West Street was 
the Haymarket. Beyond, at the south corner of Mason Street, 
was Hutch's Tavern, with Frothingham's carriage factory in tijo 
rear; farther on is seen the Old Haymarket Theatre, and, at 
the corner of Boylston Street, the residence of William Foster, 
where now the Hotel Pelhani stands. In the right foreground 
is the West Street entrance to the Common ; the trees ivceding 
along the mall disclose the river beyond, whoso bri'ezes then 
fanned and invigorated the habitues of the spot. The picture 
is from a water-color by Kobertson, once the property of John 
Howard Payne, now in possession of tlie Public Li])r!irv. The 
Whipping-Post and Pillory were situated near the West Street 
gate after their removal from State Street. 
14 



314 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Long before the Revolution, as early as 1722, a free school 
was established in what is now Mason Street, near the corner 
of West. It was then on the boundary of the Common, the 
land now lying between having been sold off from it. The 
school was called the South Writing, was the fourth in the 
town, and has, in later times, been known as the Adams School. 
The Common extended to Mason Street since 1800. 

A gun-house stood at the corner of West Street at the begin- 
ning of the lievolution, separated by a yard from the school- 
house. In this gun-house were kept two brass three-pounders 
belonging to Captain Adino Paddock's train. These pieces had 
been recast from two old guns sent by the town to London for 
that purpose, and had the arms of the province engraved upon 
them. They arrived in Boston in 1768, and were first used at 
the celebration of the King's birthday, June 4, when a salute 
was fired in King Street. Both school and gun -house are con- 
nected with a celebrated event. 

Major Paddock had expressed an intention of surrendering 
these guns to Governor Gage. The mechanics, who composed 
this company, resolved that it should not be so. The British 
general had begun to seize the military stores of the province 
and disarm the inhabitants. Accordingly, the persons engaged 
in the plot met in the school-room ; and when the attention of 
the sentinel stationed at the door of the gun-house was taken 
off by roll-call, they crossed the yard, entered the building, and, 
removing the guns from their carriages, carried tliem to the 
school-room, where they were concealed in a box in which fuel 
was ke^^t. 

The loss of the guns was soon discovered, and search made, 
in which the school did not escape. The master jolaced his 
lame foot upon the box, and it was not disturbed. Several of 
the boys were privy to the affair, but made no sign. Besides 
the schoolmaster, Abraham Holbrook, Nathaniel Balch, Samuel 

Gore, Moses Grant, Jeremiah Gridley, Whiston, and some 

others executed this conp de main. 

Boring's account says the guns remained a fortnight in the 
school-room. At the end of that time they were taken in a 



A TOUR EOUXD THE COMMON'. 315 

wheelbarrow at iiiglit and carried to AMiiston's blacksmith's 
shop at the South End, and deposited under the coal. From 
here they were taken to the American lines in a boat. The 
guns were in actual service during the whole war. After tlie 
peace the State of ^lassachusetts applied to Congress for their 
restoration, which was granted by a resolve passed May 19, 
1788, in which General Knox, Secretary at War, was directed 
to place a suitable inscription upon them. The two guns were 
called the " Hancock " and " Adams," and were in charge of the 
Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company, until presente<l, 
in 1825, by the State to the Bunker Hill ^lonument Associa- 
tion. They are now to bo seen in the chamber at the top of 
Ikinker Hill ^lonument. The inscription, except the name, is 
the same on each : — 

The Hancock : 

Sacred to Liberty. 

This is one of four cannon, 

which constituted the whole train 

of Field Artillery 

possessed by the British Colonies of 

North America 

at the commencement of the war, 

on the 19th of April, 1775. 

This cannon 

and its fellow, 

belonging to a number of citizens of 

Boston, 

were used in many engagements 

during the war. 

Tlie other two, tlie property of the 

Government of Massacliusetts, 

were taken by the enemy. 

By order of the United States 

in Congress^ assembled, 

May 19, 1788. 

The two guns referred to as captured by the enemy were 
^ncealed in a stal)le Ix'longing to a house; on the south si.le of 
Court Street, near the Court House. They were taken out over 
the Neck in a cart loaded with manure, driven by a negro ser- 
vant of George Minot, a Dorchester farmer. Tlius the four guns 
belonging to the province escaped the clutches of Gage. The 



316 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 

two last referred to were some time in possession of the Dor- 
I Chester Artillery. 

Colonnade Eow, a uniform range of twenty-four brick build- 
ings, was constructed in 1811, and occupied by the elite of 
Boston society. Each house had, or was intended to have, a 
row of freestone columns in front supporting a piazza, — hence 
the name. In 1824, after the visit of Lafayette, Amos Law- 
rence and other occuj)ants of the row petitioned to have 
Colonnade Row called Fayette Place, but it failed to receive 
official sanction, though it continued to be so called by the resi- 
dents. At the same time the name of South Allen Street was 
changed to Fayette Street. But few of the buildings in the 
row retain their original appearance, inexorable trade having 
demanded and obtained admittance into this stronghold of 
Boston aristocracy. A more plebeian ajDpellation of the block 
was " Cape Cod Row," either from the antecedents of some of 
the dwellers, or their traffic in the staple of the Commonwealth. 

The Lowells have been a distinguished family in Massachu- 
setts, from Revolutionary times to the present day. Judge 
Lowell was a delegate to the Congress of 1782-83, and was 
appointed by Washington Judge of the United States District 
Court at its organization. The judge will ever be remembered 
as the member of the convention which framed the State Con- 
stitution, where, as one of the committee to draft that in- 
strument, he inserted in the " Bill of Rights " the clause 
declaring that "all men are born free and equal," with the 
avowed purpose of abolishing slavery in the Commonwealth. 

Rev. Charles Lowell, of the West Church, was a son of 
Judge Lowell, who first studied law in Boston before he took 
up theology. Our distinguished contemporary poet, James 
Russell Lowell, is a son of the clergyman. Another of the 
sons of the Revolutionary judge was Francis Cabot Lowell, to 
wliom, more than any other, belongs the credit of establishing 
the Waltham cotton factory, the precursor of the Lowell works. 
The city of Lowell was named for him. It was his son, John 
Lowell, Jr., who founded by his will the Lowell Institute. 

At No. 1 9 of the Colonnade resided John Lowell, son of the 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 317 

judge of Revolutionary antecedents. ^Ir. Lowell acquired fame 
as a political writer, wielding a trenchant pen. As an opp(jnent 
of the " Last War," — as that of 1812 was long called, — he 
obtained considerable celebrity under his nom de plume of the 
" Boston Rebel," from the boldness and severity with which he 
attacked the administration. He refused office, deeming the 
post of honor the private station, but is remembered as a 
founder of the Massachusetts General Hospital, the Athenaium, 
Savings Bank, and the Hospital Life Insurance Company. He 
built a brick house in School Street, occupied for lawyers' 
offices, on the ground now open in front of the City Hall. 

The Massachusetts Medical College, an appendage of Harvard 
L'niversity, was at one time situated in j\Lison Street, imme- 
diately behind Colonnade Row. It was a brick etlitice, witli a 
pediment raised above the central portion. A dome, with bal- 
ustrade, surmounted the whole. The double tier of windows 
were enclosed in arches rising the whole height of the building. 
Taken altogether, its external aspect might be called ugly. 
AVithin, the central building was occupied by an anatomical 
museum, with a laboratory underneath ; the lecture-room was 
in the south wing. 

Untold horrors were associated with this building in the 
minds of the urchins who frequented the adjoining school-house. 
Its contiguity to the Common Burying-Ground, too, seemed to 
savor of a strong union l)etween demand and supplv. Tlio 
professors were regarded in tlie neighljorhood iis so many ogres, 
and the students as no better than vampires. They ate tlieir 
oysters or passed the jest over the dissecting-table with a mncf- 
froid simi)ly horrible to the uninitiated. An instance is re- 
membered of a student, who went to ])ass the evening at a 
friend's house, taking a dead woman's arm, which lie coolly 
unwrapped from a newspaper to the alfriglit of liis liostes-s. 
Tlie college was removed to the West Knd, wliere it has ac- 
quired a fearful notoriety in connection with a well-remembered 
tragedy enacted there. 

The Haymarket Theatre stood next south of Colonnade Row. 
This was an immense structure of wood, erected in 1796, and 



318 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

opened December 26, of that year, by Powell, of the Federal 
Street. Powell had fallen out with the proprietors of the latter 
house, and the Haymarket was built by his friends. It was 
designed to accommodate the middling interest, but the town 
could not support two theatres. The property proved a poor 
speculation, and was demolished after standing six years only. 
The huge structure was said to have been the largest and best- 
arranged theatre in America ; while it stood it was a source of 
terror to the neigliborhood from its liabilit}^ to take fire. No 
other theatrical enterprise was started in Boston until the 
Washington Garden entertainments, in 1819. 

The Haymarket opened with the " Belle's Stratagem." Mr. 
J. A. Dickson, afterwards of the Federal Street, appeared on the 
boards here for the first time. He became, after his retirement 
from the stage, a well-known merchant in Cornhill, and accu- 
mulated a handsome fortune. Dickson was the first agent in 
this country of Day and Martin's blacking. Mrs. Darley made 
her debut at this theatre as Narcissa in " Inkle and Yarico." 
There were a pit, gallery, and three tiers of boxes, with a hand- 
some saloon and minor conveniences for the audience. Mr, and 
Mrs. G. L. Barrett also appeared at this house, the latter making 
her debut as Mrs. Beverly in the " Gamester." The following 
was the bill on the opening night at the Haymarket : — 

BELLE'S STRATAGEM. 

Doricourt, S. Powell. 

Sir George Touchwoofl, Marriott. 

Flutter, C. Powell. 

Saville, J. H. Dickson. 

Courtall, Taylor. 

Villars, A Young American. 

Hardy, Simson. 

Letitia Hardy, Mrs. S. Powell. 

Lady Frances, Mrs. Hughes. 

Miss Ogle, Miss Harrison. 

Mrs. Racket, Mrs. Simpson. 

The Winthrop House and the adjoining Freemason's Hall, 
which made the corner of Boylston Street, were destroyed by 
fire in April, 1864, which left nothing but the walls standing. 
The present grand temple of Masonry succeeds to both the 



A TOUR TvOUND THE COMMON. 319 

former. It is a magnificent monument of this angle of tlio 
Common. 

The Masonic Temple is not unworthily sup})orte(l on tlie 
opposite corner by the Hotel Boylston, — a site which will n<'V<'r 
lose interest as the home of John Quincy Adams, sixth President 
of the United States. In the old mansiondiouse was born 
Charles Francis Adams, who has erected the splendid edilice 
we are regarding. 

Boylston Street was the ancient Frog Lane of the South End. 
Its route was the same as now, except that the sea washed the 
southerly end at the foot of the Common. We have remarked 
that the fathers of Boston were not particular about names. 
The future was veiled from them, and any peculiarity served 
their purpose. The amphibious croaker may have rendered the 
air of the neighborhood vocal with his evening song in the day 
of Adams or his neighbor Foster. Sloughs and mud-holes were 
common to the vicinity. It is recorded that one, both wide and 
deep, lay in front of Mather Byles's house. The selectmen were 
importuned to see to it without avail, until one morning a pair 
of them got their chaise stuck fast in the midst, when the par- 
son accosted them with, — "Well, gentlemen, I am glad to see 
you stirring in this matter at last." 

The "Old Man eloquent" is one of the honored names on 
the roll of the Boston Bar. The Athenanim was enriclied by 
his private library at a merely nominal sum. He studied law 
with Theophilus Parsons, and wrote powerful political articles 
under the signature of Publicola, in 1791, advocating neutrality 
with France. Minister to Holland, England, and Prussia, he 
was intimate with Burke, Fox, Sheridan, Pitt, and their con- 
temporaries of the period of the French Revolution. A mem- 
ber of the United States Senate from 1803 to 1808, his views 
on the measures of Mr. Jefferson were in conflict with those of 
Massachusetts, and he resigned. He was rainist(>r to Russia in 
1809, and a commissioner at Ghent in 1815. Again minister 
to England in 1817, he became subse(]uently Mr. Monror's 
Secretary of State, and his successor in 1825. In IS.'H lie was 
returned to Congress, where he continued until his sudden 



320 ' LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

decease in the Capitol in 1848. "This is the last of earth; I 
am content," were the last words he spoke. 

Mr. Adams was minister to Russia during the invasion of 
Bonaparte. When questioned as to the burning of Moscow, 
he stated that both the Emperor and Eostopchin, the governor, 
denied having ordered it. Had the government assumed the 
responsibility, they would have been obliged to indemnify the 
sufferers. 

In Miss Quincy's Memoir are some interesting personal recol- 
lections of Mr. Adams while at the court of St. Petersburg. 
Said he : — 

" I never saw Alexander on the throne. He was a man who cared 
little about thrones, and was one of the most complete republicans, 
in character and manners, I have ever known. He used to walk the 
streets of St. Petersburg every day, and stop and talk to every one 
he met. He was extremely popular, and I do not believe he was 
carried off by treachery. Alexander, during the whole of the war 
with Bonaparte, exposed himself as much as any of his officers. At 
the close of that war he was undoubtedly one of the first generals 
in Europe. Moreau was killed at his side by a cannon-ball from the 
walls of Dresden." 

Speaking of Moreau's death, Mr. Adams observed : — 

" He was fighting against his country, which no man can ever be 
justified in doing. A man, if he disapproves a government or a war, 
may remain quiet and neutral ; but nothing should ever induce him 
to take up arms against his country. I saw Moreau's funeral at St. 
Petersburg, which was attended with great j^omj)." 

The victor of Hohenlinden was excluded by decree from the 
ranks of the French army, July 6, 1804, and under the surveil- 
lance of a colonel of gendarmes went to Cadiz, where he em- 
barked for the United States. Moreau was in America eight 
years, during which he travelled extensively, visiting Boston 
among other places. The venerable William Minot, of this 
city, stated, at a recent interview, that he remembers seeing the 
geneml in a passing carriage while he was in Boston. He went 
to Niagara Falls, and descended the Ohio and Mississij^pi. A 
small affluent of the Missouri is /lamed for him. 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 321 

He lived for some time at Morrisville, in Pennsylvania, in a 
house purchased l)y him on the banks of the Delaware, — the 
most conspicuous in the place. The general was very affable 
and hospitable. He also resided in Xew York, where he was 
much consulted by American politicians, though he sedulously 
abstained from party intrigue himself. After a residence of 
about eight years in the United States he returned to Europe, 
to engage in the strife then raging there. The American vessel 
which carried Moreau — this was in 1813 — was permitted to 
pass the blockade by Admiral Cockburn, at the request of tlie 
liussian minister. 

His death-bed was attended by the King of Prussia, the 
Emperor of Austria, and Emperor Alexander, who manifested 
the deepest grief at his loss. Metternich, Schwartzenburg, and 
the allied generals visited him, and Alexander, who had a great 
friendship for the dying general, held him a long time in his 
arms. The following is an extract of a letter to jMadame ^Moreau, 
written by him, with a steady hand, while sinking under the 
amputation of his limbs : — 

" My dear friend, at the battle of Dresden, three days ago, I had 
both legs carried away by a cannot shot. That scoundrul, Bonaparte, 
is always lucky." 

Charles Francis Adams passed his boyhood with his father 
at St. Petersburg, and while the elder Adams was minister at 
the court of St. James, the son Aveut to an English school. He 
studied law in Webster's office, and was admitted to the bar, 
but never practised. Mr. Adams, after having edited a Boston 
newspaper, and served in the legislature, was the candidate of 
the Free Soil party for the Vice-presidency in 1848. But Mr. 
Adams is best known by his diplomatic services at the same 
court where his father served so long. His conduct of delicate 
negotiations during the great civil war was such as to place him 
at the head of American cUplomats. His services were recently 
required by our government in the negotiations at Geneva, 
arising from the Alabama and other claims. ]\Ir. Adams mar- 
ried a daughter of Peter C. Brooks, a wealthy citizen of Boston. 

In this corner of the Common, and adjoining the Burying- 
14* u 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



Grjiind on the east, were situated the hay-scales, after their 
removal from the corner of West Street, and also a gun-house ; 
the latter was transferred, in 1826, to a location near the present 
Providence depot. It contained a laboratory, well furnished 
with warlike material. There was also a laboratory on Pleasant 
Strp.et, between the corner of Boylston and Pfafi''s Hotel, during 
the Revolution, on what is now called Park Square, and another, 
subseipiently lised by Frothingham, Wheeler, and Jacobs as a 
carriage factory, and seen in the frontispiece. 

The first manufacture of duck was begun by an incorporated 
company in Boston, about 1790. They erected buildings on a 
large lot in Boylston Street, at the corner of Tremont. In 

1792 they were in the full tide 
of success, employing four lum- 
dred operatives, and turning 
out fifty pieces a week of ex- 
cellent canvas. Here were man- 
ufactured the Constitution's 
sails, so that she was an Amer- 
ican ship throughout, except in 
her armament. The manufac- 
ture of cotton began in New 
England as early as 1643, and calico printing was undertaken 
in Boston before 1794. 

During the war of 1812 a number of field-pieces belonging to 
the government were collected in this corner of the Common, 
and the city military took turns mounting guard over the park. 
The New England Guards, which were organized in 1812, per- 
formed their share of this duty, and several of the members, 
among whom was Abbott Lawrence, got their one hundred and 
sixty acres of land from the general government in requital for 
a certain term of service here, at the Charlestown Navy Yard, 
and at Noddle's Island. There were sixty-seven names on the 
muster-roll in 1814, and in 1859, after the lapse of nearly half 
a century, forty-three of the sixty-seven were still living, of 
whom a mere handful of au;ed men now survive. 




OLD LOOM. 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 323 



CHAPTEE XL 

A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON CONTINUED. 

Common Burying-Ground. — Joshua Bates. — Public Garden. — Ropewalks. 

— Topography of the Common. — British Troops on. — Description of tlieir 
Camps. —The Light Horse. —Powder House. — OKI Ehii. — Witclicraft 
and Quaker Executions. — The Duel in 1728. — Mill-Dam. — Mexican 
Volunteers. — Beacon Street. — Prescott. — Copley. — Jolin Phillies. — 
Wendell Phillips. — Robert C. Winthrop. — Hancock Mansion. — Governor 
Hancock. — General Clinton. — State House. — Public Statues, etc. — 
The Beacon. — The Monimient. — Lafayette's Residence. — George Ticknor. 

— Malbone. — Samuel Dexter. — Incidents of Lafayette's Visit in 1824. — 
Josiah Quincy, Jr. — Historical Resume. — Repeal of the Stamp Act. 

THE Common Burying-Ground has but little antiquity com- 
pared with the Chapel, Copp's Hill, or Granary Cemeteries. 
It was opened after these in 1756, and has, according to its 
changing relations with others, been called at various times the 
South and Central Ground. 

Under Mayor Armstrong, the Boylston Street ^lall was car- 
ried across the foot of the Common, cutting off some of the 
tombs on that side of the graveyard. The owners of the 
vaults resisted the invasion of the sacred dust, but the im- 
provement was accomplished by which Beacon and Tremont 
Street ]\falls were connected. 

Unsupported tradition has given to the Common Ground 
the credit of being first used for negro burials, l)ut we find no 
better evidence of this than that some very thick skulls were 
dug up at a considerable depth from the surfoce. It is known, 
however, that this was the sepulchre of such of the common sol- 
diers as died from disease during the British occupation, and of 
those who died from their wounds received at Bunker Hill. 
They were buried in a common trench, according to military 
custom, and many of the remains were exhumed when the ex- 
cavations were proceeding at the northwest corner of the yard. 



324 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

The officers who died of their hurts at Bunker Hill were in- 
terred in the churches and cemeteries, hastily, but with greater 
decency. Many of these have been forwarded to their far- 
away homes. 

We cannot pass the Public Library without an allusion to 
its great benefactor, Joshua Bates. This eminent Bostonian, 
who became a member of the great house of the Barings in 
London, was a poor boy, almost as humble as the least among 
those who daily benefit by his generosity. He attracted the 
attention of his patron, William Gray, while driving a load of 
stones on his father's team. His quick, ready replies interested 
the merchant, who gave him a place in his counting-house, 
whence graduated a financier second to none in the Old or 
New World. 

In the Public Library is a Revolutionary relic of interest, 
which acquired an even greater importance in connection with 
the Sanitary Commission in the war of Rebellion. It is the 
original capitulation of Burgoyne at Saratoga, with the signa- 
tures of the king's commander, Riedesel, and the lesser officers, 
EngHsh and Hessian, in order of rank. 

" In vain they fought, in vain they fled ; 
Their chief, luimane and tender, 
To save the rest, soon thought it best 
His forces to surrender." 

Where now the Public Garden is teeming with beauty, 
nearly the whole extent of the ground was occupied by rope- 
walks, five in number. As you pass along Charles Street going 
in the direction of Beacon, these ropewalks stretched about 
three fourths of the distance, there meeting the water which 
washed Charles Street. On the other hand, they continued 
nearly to Eliot Street. Charles Street was divided from the 
Common about 1804. 

These ropewalks were the successors of those in Pearl and 
Atkinson Streets, destroyed by fire in 1794. The town granted 
the tract in order to prevent the erection of new buildings in 
a district they endangered, as well as to render substantial aid 
to the unfortunate rope-makers ; they were again consumed in 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 325 

their new location in 1806. The land whereon these rope- 
walks were situated was marsh, or flats, whicli indeed was 
the prior condition of nearly all that low ground now known 
as the parade of the Common. At high tides most of this 
tract was probably overflowed. On the verge of it was a little 
elevation known as Fox Hill, long ago levelled to contribute to 
the filling of the marsh. As long ago as 1750 the town voted 
to lease these marsh-lands ; but if they were used, the purpose 
has not transpired. 

To continue the topography of this region of the Common, 
from the bottom of Beacon Street to Cambridge Bridge was a 
high bluff", similar to the headlands of the harbor islands ; the 
base washed by the river. Excellent springs, covered at high 
water, trickled along the beach. This eminence, known as West 
Hill, was occupied by the British as a mortar-battery ; it has 
been reduced to a convenient grade, and employed in making 
Charles Street. It seems clear that the shore or beach once 
left this headland with an inward sweep, southerly to the 
higher ground at the foot of Boylston Street. 

After .the era of improvement was begun by the Blount 
Vernon proprietors, the hill was reduced by them. In this 
labor they employed the first railway used in Xew England, by 
an inclined plane, over which box cars conveyed their loads to 
tlie water at the foot of the hill. About this time a sea wall 
was built along Charles Street from Beacon to Boylston. 

To return to the ropewalks. The town, in its generosity, 
invested the proprietors wdth a title which might have forever 
prevented the existence of the Public Garden, now properly a 
part and parcel of the Common. The riglits of the proprie- 
tors were finally purchased by the city. The question whether 
the city should seU these lands lying west of Charles Street, 
was, in 1824, negatived by the citizens, who thus decided to 
preserve the beautiful view of the river and its shores beyond, 
now obstructed by the newly erected city of the Back Bay. In 
this manner has been secured the Public Garden, — 

** Where opening roses breathing sweets diffuse, 
And soft carnations shower tlieir bahny dews : 



326 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Where lilies smile in virgin robes of white, 
The thin undress of superficial light, 
And varied tulips show so dazzling gay, 
Blushing in bright diversities of day, 
Each painted fioweret in the lake below 
Surveys its beauties, whence its beauties grow. " 

From the bottom of the Common the troops were embarked 
in silence for Lexington, at about ten o'clock on the night pre- 
ceding the memorable 19th of April. On the Common were 
arrayed the forces engaged at Bunker Hill before they marched 
to the points of embarkation. Many a tall fellow heard the 
drums beat the rappel for the last time as he shouldered his 
firelock, and fell in the ranks on that eventful morning. 

Of the first troo]3S which the Ministry despatched to Boston, 
the 29th went into camp on the Common for a short time, un- 
til they were quartered in various parts of the town. The 14th 
and the Train marched with the 29th to the Common from 
Long Wharf, but were assigned to other localities. On the 31st 
of October, 1768, took place the first military execution ever 
witnessed in Boston. The doomed man was Eichard Ames, a 
private of the 1 4th ; his crime, desertion. He was shot on the 
Common, both regiments being present under arms. Inter- 
cession was made with General Gage to spare the man's life 
without avail. 

These were not the first troops to use the town training-field 
by many, but their coming marked an epoch in history. The 
provincial forces of Shirley and Pepperell enlivened the green 
sward in 1745; and in 1758, on the 13th January, General 
Amherst and his army, 4,500 strong, disembarked from their 
ships, and j^itched their tents on tlie Common. This was the 
force destined to operate against Canada. At this time, and 
long afterwards, the British ofilcers wore bayonets. A portrait 
of General Wolfe is extant with a firelock slung at his back and 
the bayonet by his side. Burgoyne's officers also wore them 
when they came to Boston in 1777. 

The Highland Eegiment, commanded by Colonel Eraser, ex- 
cited the admiration of the town, which had seen nothing like 
it before. Their colonel was the same who displayed such con- 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 327 

spicuous bravery at the battle of Stillwater in 1777, under 
Burgoyne's command. In the crisis of the second day's ])attle 
General Morgan called some of his trusty riilenien, and, ixunting 
out the gallant Briton, said to them : " That gallant ofHcer is 
General Eraser. I admire and honor him, but it is necessary 
he should die ; victory for the enemy depends upon liim. Take 
your stations in that clump of bushes, and do your duty." In 
a few minutes Eraser fell, mortally wounded. He recpiestetl to 
be buried in a redoubt he had erected, which was accordingly 
done, under the fire of the American guns. The object of the 
burial-party being discovered, the firing ceased, except the oc- 
casional booming of a minute-gun in honor of the valor of the 
deceased soldier. Eraser's regiment was with AVolfe at the 
memorable ascent of the Heights of Abraham in 1759, and, 
under Murray, was engaged at the battle of Quebec in 1760. 

On the 2d July, 1774, the train of artillery from the Castle 
landed, and marched to the Common. On the 4th of October 
there "were iwo regiments stationed here, and it continued there- 
after a permanent camp until the evacuation. Two companies 
were stationed in the mortar redoubt, and also held a small 
three-gun battery higher up on the slope of the hill. AVlien 
the British departed, the thirteen-inch mortar from the battery 
was found lying on the beach, where it liad been overturned, 
uninjured. Another of the same calibre, found sunk at the end 
of Long ^^Hiarf, was placed by the Americans in the South 
Battery. One of these Revolutionary relics was taken to 
Charlestown Navy Yard ; the other was mounted on the bat- 
tery at N'ew York, the same year it was captured. Two twelve- 
pounders from the battery on Beacon Hill were also secured by 
the Americans. There were a few shot thrown into the Uritish 
camp during the siege by an American floating battery, but no 
liarm was done. 

The positions of the British defences and encani]mients on 
the Common during the winter of 1775-7(3 were as follows : 
A small earthwork was thrown up at the nortliwest corner, a 
little higher up than the present entrance on (/harles Street ; 
this was designed for infantry, and held by a single company. 



328 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

The little elevation mentioned by the name of Fox Hill was 
nearly or quite surrounded by water at times, and was hence 
called the island ; on this was a small redoubt. At the south- 
west corner, at a point at high-water mark, — now intersected 
by Boylston Street extension, — was another breastwork for 
infantry. South of this was a strong redoubt, which would be 
bisected by Hollis Street, were it extended to the shore as it 
then existed ; one front faced Pleasant Street, while the other 
was along the then beach. This formed the first line, the 
Pleasant Street redoubt and the battery at the foot of Beacon 
Street being on the flanks. 

On the westerly slope of the hill overlooking the parade, and 
on which the flagstaff is now situated, was a square redoubt, 
behind which lay encamped a battalion of infantry ; to the east, 
and on a line with the easternmost point of the hill, were two 
half-moons for small arms, with a second battalion in its rear. 
About opposite Carver Street, resting on the southwest corner 
of the burial-ground, was a bastioned work, directly across 
Boylston Street. This was the second line. On the hill for- 
merly known as Flagstaff Hill, but now dedicated to the sol- 
diers' monument, the artillery was parked, protected by intrench- 
ments. Immediately behind this hill, stretching from the 
burial-ground across to Beacon Street Mall, were the camps of 
three battalions of infantry. Such were the dispositions to 
prevent a landing by the American forces under Washington. 
None of the works were formidable except the most southern, 
which was connected with the lines on the Neck. The Common 
was an intrenched camp, with a regular garrison of 1,750 men. 

The remains of the British works were visible until the be- 
ginning of the century. Persons are still living who have seen 
the holes made by the soldiers for their kitchens, and the ditches 
on the hill where the monument is to stand. * 

The strength of the British position may be inferred from 
the fact that Du Coudray, an experienced French oflicer of 
artillery, engaged by our commissioners to command that arm 
in our service, laughed long and heartily on viewing from Bea- 
con Hill the works which the Britisli had erected, and which 
they had so precipitately abandoned. 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 329 

Behind the three-gun battery situated on Beacon Hill were a 
number of ropewalks, bounding north on Myrtle Street, and 
occupied in Itevolutionary times by Henderson Inches. This 
was the camp of the British Light Horse, who used the rope- 
walks as their stables, and the Old South as a riding-schooL 
Belknap Street is now continued directly through these rope- 
walks. The spur of Beacon Hill known as Mt. Vernon, and for 
which that street takes its name, Avas called Mt. Hoardam, and 
Mt. Whoredom, a difference merely of orthography. AVe shall 
see that the military positions in and around the Common were 
presided- over by some distinguished personages. 

In May, 1 706, an act was passed erecting a Powder House in 
the town, and one was built on the hill near the Frog Pond. 
There was another pond on the Common in early times called 
the Horse Pond, a stagnant pool of water long since filled up. 
It was situated a little to the southeast of old Flagstafi' Hill, 
and was connected by a ditch with the river ; across the ditch 
a little foot-bridge was thrown. A third pond, to the westward, 
was called Sheehan's, from a man of that name hanged there. 
The Powder House referred to must not be confounded with 
the one at West Boston, — a much larger and better-built 
magazine. 

The superficial features of the Common, except in the in- 
stances pointed out, remain unchanged. The Mighty Elm yet 
rears its hoary front, and puts forth its verdure as of old. It 
is the only living though dumb witness of the pageants of 
Shirley, Amherst, Gage, and Howe. The life-current flows 
feebly through the limbs of this tree of trees, but still it stands, 
acknowledged monarch of its fellows. The green mists which 
in spring-time clothe the trees in the malls cloud but lightly 
the aged crest of the Old Elm. Kingdoms, empires, dynasties, 
have disappeared, yet the tree stands with its gnarled roots 
grasping its native earth, waiting in silent majesty the day 
when it shall be laid to its rest, full of honors and of years. 

The branches of the Old Elm, if we may believe trji<lition, 
have been adorned with strange fruit, such as Tristan T/lfcnnite 
dehghted to suspend from his master's forests. V^^v know tluit 



330 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



William Eobinson and Marmaduke Stevenson, convicted Quak- 
ers, were hung upon the Common. Mary Dyar was reprieved 
after her foot was on the fatal ladder, through the intercession of 
her son, and escaped to meet a similar fate the next year. The 
lifeless forms of Margaret Jones, of Anne Hibbins, and perhaps 




THE OLD ELM. 



other victims of judicial murder, may have depended from these 
same limbs during the reign of the witchcraft horrors. The 
remains of those who suffered at this time were treated with 
studied cruelty. Their bodies were refused their friends, and 
even the privilege of protecting their jDlace of sepulture was 
denied. 

The best judges have considered the age of this tree to be 
consideral^ly more than two hundred and fifty years. It ap- 
pears to have exceeded the usual term of maturity allotted to 
its species ; but artificial means, with great care for its preserva- 
tion, have no doubt eked out its existence. A terse biography 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 331 

of the tree is found on tlie entrance to the enclosure, placed 
there by Mayor Smith, under whose direction the fence was 
erected : — 

THE OLD ELM. 

This tree has been standing here for an unknown period. It is 

believed to have existed before the settlement of Boston 

being full grown in 17'22. Exhibited marks of 

old age in 1792, and was nearly destroyed 

by a storm in 1832. Protected 

by an Iron Enclosure 

in 1854. 
J. V. C. Smith, Mayor. 

^^It should be mentioned, however, that a tradition has been 
current which assigns to Captain Daniel Henchman — the same 
who commanded a company of foot from Boston, in Iving 
Philip's war, and was also captain of the Ancient and Honora- 
ble Artillery Company in 1G76 — the honor of planting the 
Great Elm, six years earlier. This, if true, would make the 
elm more than two hundred years old. But the tree could 
hardly have attained, in fifty-two years, to the size represented 
on the earliest plan of the town. It is also worthy of remark 
that the age of Liberty Tree, planted only sixteen years after 
the settlement, was definitely known and established by the 
Sons of Liberty, while we nowhere meet with any contempo- 
rary account of the planting of the Great Elm. 

The shooting of Matoonas, one of King Philip's sagamores, 
is chronicled in 1656. He was tied to a tree, — perhaps this 
very elm, — and met death with the stoical indifference of his 
race. 

There was, formerly, on the northerly side of the Great Elm, 
a cavity large enough to serve as a hiding-place for boys. This 
being tilled with clay and covered with canvas, in process of 
time was closed up by the natural action of the tree. Known 
a hundred years ago as The Great Tree, and appearing full- 
grown a century and a half gone by, this venerable tree may, 
without dispute, claim to be the oldest inhabitant of Boston. 

Among the events with wdiich the history of the Common is 
connected is the duel fought near the Powder House, July 3, 



332 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

1728, at between seven and eight o'clock in the evening. Both 
the combatants were young men of the first respectability; 
their names, Benjamin Woodbridge and Henry Phillips. They 
fought with swords, the former being thrust tlirough the body, 
while his adversary received some slight wounds. Phillips was 
hurried away on board the Sheerness man-of-war, then lying in 
the harbor, by liis brother Gillam Phillips, Peter Faneuil, and 
some others. The body of the unfortunate Woodbridge was 
found the next morning lying near the scene of the affray. Mr. 
Sargent, better known as the " Sexton of the Old School," has 
given some interesting details of this affair. The Faneuils and 
Phillipses were connected by marriage, which accounts for the 
agency of Peter Paneuil in Henry Phillips's escape. Young 
Woodbridge lies in the Granary Burying- Ground. 

This duel gave rise to a new law, which decreed that the 
offender, upon conviction, should " be carried publicly in a cart 
to the gallows, with a rope about his neck, and set on the gal- 
lows an hour, then to be imprisoned twelve months without 
bail." Any person killed in a duel was denied " Christian 
Burial," and interred " near the usual place of public execution 
with a stake drove through the body." Death was the penalty 
meted out to the survivor with the same vindictive pursuit of 
the senseless remains. 

When the British troops were first stationed in the town, 
they had a hospital at the bottom of the Common ; it took fire 
and was nearly consumed in May, 1769. There was also, at a 
later period, a guard-house in the same locality. 

Public executions have occurred at the bottom of the Com- 
mon, at or near the foot of Beacon Street, the criminals being 
hastily buried in the loose gravel of the beach. So carelessly 
was this performed that an eyewitness relates that he has seen 
the corpse of one victim disinterred by the sea, with the mark 
of the hangman's noose still visible. 

The Mill-Dam, or Western Avenue, is fast losing its distinc- 
tive features of yore, and shaping itself into a boulevard, bor- 
dered in its whole extent by residences. It was the greatest 
undertaking in its day Boston had witnessed ; we may even 



TOUK ROUND THE COMMON. 333 

doubt whether the far-seeing Mr. Cotting perceived it t« > he tho 
first step towards converting the Back Lay into terra firma. 

The work was begiin in 1818 by the Boston and Ixuxlniry 
Mill Corporation, but Mr. Cotting did not live to see its com- 
pletion, Colonel Loammi Baklwin succeeding him as engineer. 
In our Introduction we have given a very brief account of this 
thoroughfare. Laborers were brought from Ireland specially to 
be employed on it, and it was opened with due ceremony. A 
cavalcade of citizens crossed from the Lrookline shore, and were 
received by the inhabitants on the Boston side. 

Many recollect the entrance into the city of the Massachu- 
setts Volunteers after the Mexican war. They were almost 
literally in rags, and it was not until the charitable hands of 
Boston ladies had supplied needful clothing that the regament 
was able to march into town. Their appearance indicated little 
of the " pomp and circumstance," but much of the hard usage 
and bad rations, of glorious war. 

"We may now pursue our way up the ascent of Beacon Street 
and its neighboring mall. The expense of this mall was de- 
frayed from a fund raised by subscription to erect fortifications 
during the war of 1812, then remaining in the hands of the 
town officers. 

" Here aged trees cathedral walks compose, 
And mount the hill in venerable rows." 

The name of Beacon Street was applied very early to that 
portion north and east of the State House, and to the westerly 
part before the Revolution. At this time there were not more 
than three houses between Charles Street and the upper end 
of the Common, the Joy house, when built, making the fourth. 
The rest of the hill was covered with small cedars and native 
shrubbery, with here and there a cow-path, through which tho 
herds ranged unmolested. 

The home of Prescott, the eminent historian, was at 55 
Beacon Street. A deeper interest attaches to the laboi-s of the 
gifted author on account of his partial blindness, caused by an 
injury to his eye while at Harvard. All efforts both at liomo 
and abroad failed to improve his sight, and his literary work had 



334 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

to be performed with the aid of an amanuensis, though he 
occasionally wrote with a stylus on a writing-frame prepared ex- 
pressly for him. 'No library can be called complete that does 
not contain " Ferdinand and Isabella," '' The Conquest of 
Mexico," "Peru," and "Charles the Fifth." He died before 
completing his Philip II., which he had intended to make his 
greatest work. Mr. Prescott was the grandson of the old 
soldier of Louisburg and Bunker Hill, and by a coincidence 
married a granddaughter of that Captain Linzee who com- 
manded the Falcon at the battle just named. He was a 
D. C. L. of Old Oxford, and member of many of the learned 
societies of Europe and America. 

The mansion of the late David Sears, now a club- house, is 
rendered interesting as the site of the home of John S. Copley, 
the distinguished American painter. Copley owned the greatest 
estate in Boston, embracing eleven acres, in which were included 
the reserved six acres of Blackstone. Walnut Street was the 
eastern boundary, Pinckney Street its northern, and the bay its 
westerly limit. On the northwest corner of the tract stood the 
old Powder House to Avhich we have referred. It was built in 
1774, remote from the position of the former magazine near the 
Great Tree, where it had been exposed to accidents on days of 
public rejoicing. The walls were of Braintree granite, seven 
feet thick, with bomb-proof arch. It was surrounded by pali- 
sades, and was estimated to contain, when full, a thousand bar- 
rels of powder. Near it was a watch-house. 

Copley was in a certain sense a pupil of Smibert, the works 
of that artist having been his first studies. He married a 
daughter of Richard Clarke, a rich merchant, and one of the 
obnoxious tea-consignees. The painter acted for the consign- 
ees in one of the conferences with the town committee. The 
Clarkes had a store in King Street, and lived in the Cooke 
mansion, previously described, in School Street. The house 
was visited by a mob, and the Clarkes with the other con- 
signees retired for safety to the Castle. 

In the old two-story house which formerly stood here Cop- 
ley painted some of his beet pictures, probably those of Han- 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 



33^ 



cock and Adams among the numl)er. Here also Cliarles W. 
Peale, father of liembrandt Peale, studied with Copley in 
1768. In 1774, leaving his family in Boston, Co])ley went to 
England, where he at once gained an advanced rank among the 




THE SEARS ESTATE. 



British painters. His Death of Lord Chatliam estahlisliod his 
fame, and his large picture of the Siege and Belief of Oil)raltar 
was hung in Guildhall, London. He died suddenly in 1813. 

Dunlap relates that Copley's death was thought to have been 
hastened by the following circumstance : — 

" Some American speculator who was accpiainted with the PU]>er1) 
situation of Copley's house in Boston, overlooking the beiuitiful 
green and parade called the Common, made an offer to the painter 
for the purchase, which, in comparison to the value of property in 
former davs m Boston, seemed enormous. Copley eagerly closed 



336 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

with him, and sold the pro^Derty for a song compared with its real 
value. Shortly after, he, learning it was worth twenty times the 
money he had sold it for, tried to undo the bargain, and sent his 
lawyer son to Boston for the purpose, but it was too late." 

The following is the history of this transaction. In 1798 
Colonel William Hull, being in London, bought of Copley all 
his tract of land west of the Beacon Hill. About the same 
time Gardiner Greene, Copley's son-in-law and agent, sold the 
same property to Harrison Gray Otis and Jonathan Mason. 
The other claimants at length compromised with Colonel Hull, 
and the conveyance was made by the younger Copley in 1776, 
when he came to the United States. The society of the future 
Chancellor of Great Britain was much courted during his visit 
to Boston and New York. The elder Copley never returned to 
his native city. 

Trumbull describes Copley as an elegant-looking man, dressed 
in fine maroon cloth coat with gilt buttons. Besides being a 
painter, Copley was an engraver, having executed a portrait of 
Eev. William Welsteed of Boston. This knowledge served him 
in good stead in London. Copley, with West, was one of 
Trumbull's sureties when the latter was tlirown into j^rison in 
London. 

Lord Lyndhurst said his Either was his own master, and 
entirely devoted to his art to the last year of his life, and that 
he never saw a decent picture, except his own, until he was 
thirty. Sully's opinion of Copley was that he was equal " in 
all respects but one to West ; he had not so great despatch, but 
then he was more correct, and did not so often repeat him- 
self." 

The adverse criticism upon Copley's pictures was that they 
were crude in coloring, and wanted ease and naturalness. His 
historical paintings Avere a collection of portraits without action, 
but his draperies were considered exquisite. Dr. Dibdin con- 
sidered his portraits admirable, but too stiff and stately. A 
catalogue of the existing works of this eminent native artist 
is now being prepared by Mr. Augustus T. Perkins of Boston. 

General Knox lived in the Copley House, after the war, for 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 337 

a short time. The old mansion fronted Beacon Street, and had 
fine grounds and a stable attached. 

David Sears inherited a large fortune from his father, and, go 
where you will in Boston, you will hnd monuments of his 
wealth and enterprise. He commanded the Cadets previous 
to the war of 1812, as well as since that time. His mansion 
was long the admiration of the town. Some beautiful panels 
in the front were executed by Willard. 

Harrison Gray Otis erected a handsome residence next west 
of the Sears estate ; Judge Cushing's adjoined it on the east, 
and was the second of the three houses mentioned as consti- 
tuting Beacon Street. 

The house standing at the corner of Walnut Street was the 
first built of brick on Beacon Street. It was erected in 1804 
by Hon. John Phillips, first Mayor of Boston, and father of 
Wendell Phillips, the celebrated antislavery orator of Boston. 
His maiden speech on this question was made in Faneuil Hall 
in 1837, twenty-four years before the antagonism between the 
North and South culminated in civil war. Unlike most re- 
formers, he has lived to see the triumph of the principles to 
wliich he devoted the best years of his life. Mr. Phillips pos- 
sesses the natural gift of eloquence, and stands hardly rivalled 
as a speaker by any contemporary. 

This mansion, now considerably altered in its exterior ap- 
pearance, was next the residence of Thomas L. Winthrop, 
lieutenant-governor of Massachusetts from 1826-32, who died 
in 1841. He M^as father of the Hon. Robert C. Wintlu-op, who 
has been prominently connected with most of the societies for 
the advancement of science, art, and literature, and whose ser- 
vices in many fields of usefulness are fully acknowledged by 
his fellow-citizens. Mr. Winthrop's mother was a daughter of 
Sir John Temple, and he is, therefore, by this marriage, a 
great-grandson of Governor Bowdoin. The statue to Franklin, 
in School Street, is the product of his suggestion ; and, at its 
inauguration, he delivered an address on the life and character 
of the great Bostonian. 

15 V 



338 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

On tlie opposite corner of Walnut Street was the residence 
of B. P. Homer, a highly respected merchant. In the rear 
of Mr. Homer's, on Walnut Street, was the house in which 
Dr. George Parkman lived at the time of his murder by Web- 
ster in 1849. 

Joy Street recalls the name and estate of Dr. John Joy, ex- 
tending between this thoroughfare and Walnut Street, and 
Beacon and Mt. Vernon Streets. Dr. Joy was an apothecary 
in Washington Street, at the corner of Spring Lane. It is 
related that liis wife was much averse to a removal so far out 
of town as Beacon Street then was, and exacted a jDromise from 
the Doctor to return into the town at no distant day. In that 
day a residence in Williams Court was considered far more 
eligible. The doctor built a wooden house on the hill back 
from Beacon Street, which was ultimately removed to South 
Boston Point. 

Next to the corner of Joy Street lived Samuel T, Armstrong, 
another of Boston's chief magistrates, of whose improvement 
of the Coinmon we have recited several instances. He was the 
son of the Eevolutionary soldier, John Armstrong. Mr. Arm- 
strong was lieutenant-governor of Massachusetts in 1836. He 
had in former years been a bookseller in State Street, at the 
corner of Flagg Alley, — the firm being Belcher and Armstrong, 
— and then at Xo. 50 in Old Cornhill, the site of Paul Revere's 
shop. This vicinity took the name of Booksellers' Row, from 
the number of that trade there congregated. 

Before you come to the grounds of the State House, two 
freestone residences attract your notice. These showy edifices 
have displaced one of the noblest private mansions of the Colo- 
nial period, built by Thomas Hancock in 1737, and given to 
his nephew, the governor, by his aunt, Lydia Hancock. The 
house long remained a unique feature of the surroundings of 
the Common, until it became too antiquated for modern ideas, 
and too valuable. The front of the estate embraced from Mt. 
Vernon Street, given to the town by the governor, to Joy 
Street, formerly Clapboard, and since Belknap Street. All of 
the State House and part of the Reservoir ground, including Han- 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 



;30 




HANCOCK MANSIUN. 



cock Avenvie, Mt, Vernon Place, and a part of Hancock Street, 
in which was situated 
his nursery, belonged 
to the Hancocks. The 
site of the State House 
was Hancock's pasture ; 
and gardens and or- 
chards surrounded this 
truly princely mansion. 

The building was of 
stone, built in the sub- 
stantial manner favored 
by the wealthier Bos- 
tonians. The walls 
were massive. A bal- 
cony projected over the 
entrance - door, upon 
which opened a large window of the second story. The cor- 
ners and window-openings were ornamented with Braintree 
stone, and the tiled roof was surmounted by a balustrade. Dor- 
mer windows jutted out from the roof, from which might be 
obtained a view as beautiful as extensive. A low stone wall 
protected the grounds from the street, on which was placed a 
light wooden fence, \^ith gate-posts of the same material. A 
paved walk and a dozen stone steps conducted to the mansion, 
situated on rising ground at a little distance back from the 
street. Before the door was a wide stone slab, worn by the 
feet of the distinguished inhabitant and his illustrious guests. 
A wooden hall, designed for festive occasions, sixty feet in 
length, was joined to the northern wing ; it was afterwards re- 
moved to Allen Street. 

"As you entered the governor's mansion, to the right was the 
drawing or reception room, with furniture of bird's-cyi' niapk^ cov- 
ered with rich damask. Out of this o])(MK'(1 \hv diiiing-hall referred 
to, in which Hancock gave the famous breakfast to A(hniral D'Estaing 
and his officers. Opposite this was a sinalh-r apart incnt, llu 
dining-hall of the family ; next adjoining were the 
offices, with coach-house and barn behind. 



usual 
hina-rooni and 



340 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 

" At the left of tlie entrance was a second salcjon, or family draw- 
ing-room, the walls covered with crimson paper. The upper and 
lower halls were hung with pictures of game, hunting-scenes, and 
other subjects. Passing through this hall, another flight of steps led 
through the garden to a small summer-house close to Mt. Vernon 
Street. The grounds were laid out in ornamental flower-beds bor- 
dered with box ; box-trees of large size, with a great variety of 
fruit, among which were several immense mulberry-trees, dotted the 
garden." 

Such is the description given by Miss Eliza G. Gardner, many 
years an inmate of the Hancock House. 

Tliis was the house pillaged by the soldiers about the time 
of the battle of Lexington, who also broke down and mutilated 
the fences, until, on complaint of the selectmen, General Gage 
sent Percy to occupy it. It is also stated that in the previous 
month of March British officers had set an example to the men 
by hacking the fences with their swords, breaking windows, 
etc. A few days afterwards Hancock was again intruded upon 
by his red-coated neighbors, who refused to retire from his 
premises at his request, and mockingly told him his possessions 
would soon be theirs. 

At this time Gage had an order from the king for Hancock's 
apprehension, but he feared to meet the issue ; a second order 
directed him to hang the patriot. The wrath against Hancock 
escaped in a variety of ways more harmless. One of the effa- 
sions indited to the patriot reads thus : — 

'* As for their king, John Hancock, 
And Adams, if they 're taken, 
Their heads for signs shall hang up high 
Upon that hill called Beacon." 

The Hancock House became the quarters of General Clinton 
while he remained in Boston ; he took command at Charles- 
town, September, 1775. Both house and stables were in part 
occupied by the wounded from Bunker Hill. The house, how- 
ever, received no important injury during the occupation, the 
furniture showing but little signs of ill-usage, and the pictures 
remaining untouched. 

In this house Hancock had entertained D'Estaing in 1778, 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 341 

Lafayette in 1781, Washington in 1789, Brissot, chief of the 
Girondists, and, in later times, Lords Stanley and Worthy, and 
Labouchiere and Bougainville. 

D'Estaing rested under a cloud for his desertion of our forces 
in Rhode Island, but was, nevertheless, hospitably entertained 
by Hancock. About forty of the French officers dined every 
day at the governor's table, for he was a generous host. On one 
occasion an unusual number assembled to partake of the gov- 
ernor's viands, when, in the language of Madam Hancock, " the 
Common was bedizened with lace." The cooks were driven to 
despair, and the exigency was only met by milking the cows on 
the Common. We do not learn whether this was acceptable to 
the owners of the cows. The Count requited the governor's 
entertainments by a grand dinner on board liis ship. The 
governor's lady, seated near her host, was requested to puU a 
cord, which was the signal for a discharge of all the guns of 
the squadron. The good dame confessed herself surprised at 
this coup de theatre. 

Brissot was astonished to find the governor in friendly con- 
verse with "a hatter" (Nathaniel Balcli). Balch was a great 
favorite of the governor's. He was a " fellow of infinite jest," 
majestic in appearance, benevolent, and of sterling worth. His 
witticisms never failed "to set the table in a roar." Loring 
relates that when Hancock had occasion to go into the district 
of Maine on an official visit, he was attended by Hon. Azor 
Orne of his council, and his old friend Balch. Their arrival 
at Portsmouth, N. H., was thus humorously announced : — 

" On Thursday last, arrived in this town, Nathaniel Balch, Esq., 
accompanied by His Excellency John Hancock, and the Hon. Azor 
Orne." 

When Hancock was dying he called his old friend Baldi to 
his bedside, and dictated to him the minutes of his will, in 
which he expressly gave his mansion-house to the Common- 
wealth. Death intervened before this intention could l)e carried 
out. 

A strong effort was made to save this old New England mon- 
ument, but without avail. It was proposed by Governor Banks, 



342 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 

in 1859, that the Commonwealth should purchase it, and the 
heirs offered it at a low valuation. A joint committee of the 
Legislature reported favorably upon the measure, but it met 
with strong opposition from the rural districts, and was defeated. 
Suggestions were offered to make it the residence of the gov- 
ernors, or a museum for the collection of Eevolutionary relics. 
The house was in excellent preservation, the interior wood-work 
being sound as when the halls echoed to the tread of the old 
governor. The chamber of Lafayette remained as when he 
slept in it ; the apartment in which Hancock died was intact ; 
the audience-hall was the same in which Washington, D'Estaing, 
Brissot, the Percy, and many more had stood ; and, finally, the 
entrance-hall, in which for eight days the dead patriot lay in 
state, opened upon the broad staircase as in the time of old 
Thomas and Lydia Hancock. 

State action failing, some efforts were made by the city, in 
1863, to secure the relics of the building itself. The heirs 
offered the mansion, with the pictures and some other objects 
of historical interest, as a free gift, with the design of preserv- 
ing it as a memento of Colonial and Eevolutionary history. It 
was proposed to take it down and erect it anew on some other 
site. Eew will regret that such an historical anachronism was 
not committed. The building was pulled down, and with it 
disappeared the only monument to the memory of John Han- 
cock. 

Governor Hancock entered the Latin School in 1745. He 
went to England when quite young, where he witnessed the 
coronation of the monarch who afterwards set a price upon his 
head. President of the Provincial Congress in 1774, of the 
Continental Congress in 1776, he first affixed his bold auto- 
graph to the Declaration of Independence, and it thus circu- 
lated upon the floor of Congress. We find him acting as 
moderator at a town-meeting in 1778, the same year he was 
appointed major-general of the Massachusetts militia. We have 
seen him presiding over and directing the action of the conven- 
tion which ratified the Federal Constitution, and at the peace, 
the choice of the people of his native State as their chief 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 343 

magistrate. Hancock died sincerely regretted. If he had some 
conspicuous faults, they were more than counterbalanced by his 
many noble qualities. 

Hancock was tall, nearly six feet, and thin. In later years 
he stooped a little, and was a martyr to the gout. In his attire 
he Avas a type of the fine gentleman of his day, — a scarlet coat^ 
richly embroidered, with rufdes of the finest Hnen, being his 
ordinary dress. 

We give herewith a fac-simile of the much-admired auto- 
graph of Governor Hancock appended to a ticket of the lottery 
authorized by law for the rebuilding of Faneuil Hall after the 
fire of 1761. The engraving is of the exact size of the originaL 



Bos TOM June 1765. ♦ 

. Faneuil-UdW LOTTERY, No. Five. * 

?4^ /-nr HE Poffeffor of this Ticket (No 3^^^ ) ^ 
j> JL " intitled to aE^ Prize drawn againd faid -^ 
Number, io a Lottery granted by an Aft of ^ 
the General Court of the Pror'mce of Khz/yiaffachufettt- 
Bay, for Rebaildiog FAMEua-HALt ; fubjcA to bo 
Dcdflilion. 



^ 




^S^r^iia^^ 



FANEUIL HALL LOTTERY TICKET. 



We have reached the highest point of the city, and can 
leisurely contemplate the immense pile of the State House, 
with its glistening dome, which fitly crowns the view of Bos- 
ton as you approach by land or water. It is another monument 
to the genius of Charles Bulfinch, by whom it was designed. 
Were we to ascend to the cupola we shoukl see a panorama 
spread before us which even the famed Neapolitan S(\iport can 
hardly surpass. But of Old Boston, as it stood when tlie first 
Legislature assembled in the Capitol, we should find but little 



remaining. 



344 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Dr. Holmes has said in his " Autocrat," — 

" Boston State House is the hub of the solar system. You 
could n't pry that out of a Boston man if you had the tire of all 
creation straightened for a crowbar." 

This expression thus applied only to the State House, but 
since modified into the " Hub of the Universe," is now gener- 
ally used in connection with Boston itself, until the Bostonian 
abroad has become familiar and even content with hearing 
his native or adopted city styled the " Hub " from Maine to 
California. 

The State House tract was passed by the town to the Com- 
monwealth in 1795; the nominal consideration was five shil- 
lings. Samuel Adams laid the corner-stone July 4 of the 
same year, dedicating it forever to liberty and the rights of 
man. In 1798 it was completed, and occupied by the legisla- 
ture. Increase Sumner being then governor. The building re- 
ceived enlargement in 1855, which cost considerably more than 
the original edifice. 

The adornment of our public grounds with statues of dis- 
tinguished men is becoming a feature of Boston. Washington, 
Franklin, Webster, Mann, Everett, Hamilton, and the dis- 
coverer of America have effigies in bronze or marble in their 
honor. But where are the statues to Hancock, Otis, the 
Adamses, Quincy, and the rest 1 

A copy in plaster of Houdon's Washington, at Richmond, 
Ya., is in the vestibule of the Athena3um, as is also a plaster 
model of the statue of Bowditch by Ball Hughes. The figure 
of the Saviour on the apex of the pediment of the Church of 
the Immaculate Conception is a copy from Thorwaldsen. The 
Aristides and Columbus in Louisburg Square are specimens 
of Italian art, and were imported by Mr. lasigi. The statue 
of Hamilton in granite in Commonwealth Avenue is by Dr. 
Rimmer, and is believed to have been the first in the country 
cut from that material. There are also three typical figures in 
granite on the front of Horticultural Hall, representing Flora, 
Ceres, and Pomona. These are by Milmore. 

The bronze statue of Webster in the State House grounds is 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 345 

by Powers. It was the second executed by the artist, the first 
being lost at sea while en route from Legliorn. The work 
hardly fulfilled the expectations of Mr. Webster's admirers, or 
the hopes founded on the high reputation of the sculptor. It 
was first placed in the vestibule of the Athenteum, until removed 
to its present position by consent of the Legislature. 

The statue of Horace Mann was cast in Munich, and is the 
work of Miss Stebbins. The fund was raised by the contri- 
butions of school-children and teachers throughout the State. 
The State paid for the pedestal. 

In the vestibule are the statues of Governor Andrew and 
of Washington. The latter was placed in the State House in 
1827, and is by Sir F. Chantrey. The idea originated with 
gentlemen of Boston who had been associated with AVashing- 
ton in public life. They organized under the name of the 
Washington Monument Association, and first intended to erect 
an equestrian statue, — a purpose which want of sufficient funds 
obliged them to abandon. The j^ose of the figure is majestic 
and at the same time without stiffness ; the military cloak 
thrown across the shoulders gives an ease and grace to the 
whole design. Chantrey began as a carver climbing to emi- 
nence in art from the lowest round of the ladder. 

The torn and battle-stained colors of the IMassachusetts 
regiments are here gathered in the keeping of the Common- 
wealth. In life, Governor Andrew presented most of these flags ; 
his statue is tlieir appropriate guardian. 

In the lower lialls are also placed the tablets from the monu- 
ment formerly on the summit of Beacon HiU. They are four 
feet four inches long, and three feet three inches wide. The 
gilt eagle which perched upon the top of the column lias found 
a place over the Speaker's chair, in the Hall of Iie])resentatives. 
A bust of Samuel Adams is affixed to a niclie in tlie Avail ; and 
the alcove in which stands the Chantrey statue is flanked by 
two brass cannon consecrated to the valor of Isaac Pavis and 
John Buttrick, two heroes of the battle of Lexington. 

On the 26th of August, 1824, Laftiyette received the citizens 
of Boston in the lower hall; and on the next day a second 
15* 



346 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

reception was given by the distinguished Frenchman. Il^o 
greater crowds ever thronged to do homage to any visitor in 
the halls of the Capitol. On this occasion the national stand- 
ard was displayed for the first time from the cupola. 

When the General was again in Boston in 1825, to assist at 
the laying of the corner-stone of Bunker Hill Monument, the 
Legislature resolved to invite him to meet it in the Hall of 
Eepresentatives, and requested ex-Governor Lincoln to address 
him on the occasion. The General was received by both 
houses in joint convention on the 16th of June, Governor 
Lincoln in the Speaker's chair. Among the distinguished guests 
was Mr. Barbour, United States Secretary of War. 

In the Senate Cliamber are portraits of the old Colonial 
governors Endicott, Winthrop, Leverett, Bradstreet, and Bur- 
net. A fine portrait of Governor Sumner, presented by General 
W. H. Sumner, hangs above the President's chair. There are 
also portraits of Francis Higginson, first minister of Salem, 
and of Eobert Rantoul. 

On the front of the gallery are some interesting relics of the 
battle of Bennington, presented by General John Stark. They 
are a musket, drum, a heavy trooper's sword, and grenadier's 
cap with the curious conical brass plate, on which, as well as 
the brass plate of the drum, is embossed the emblematic horse 
of the Duchy of Westphalia. 

Underneath is the letter of acceptance written by order of 
the General Assembly, and signed by Jeremiah Powell, Presi- 
dent of the Council. 

Besides these are two old firelocks, bequeathed to the State 
by Rev. Theodore Parker. One of them has the maker's name 
on the lock-plate, " Grice, 1762," and an inscription on the butt 
as follows : — 

" The First Fire Arm, • 

Captured in the 
War for Indej)endence. " 

The other is more antiquated in appearance. It has the donor's 
name on the lock-plate, and an inscription on the breech which 
reads, — 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 



347 




*' This Firearm was used by 

Capt John Parker 

in the Battle of Lexington 

April 19th 

1775." 

In connection with the State House we present an en- 
graving of the desk, long used in the Old State House by- 
successive speakers of the House of Eepresentatives. Ou the 
removal of the Legislature from 
their time-honored place of meet- 
ing, this desk was deemed too an- 
tiquated for further service. It 
is now one of the interesting me- 
morials of the colony in the keep- 
ing of the Historical Society. The 
chair is a relic of Plymouth Col- 
ony, having belonged to Governor 
Edward Winslow, and is also de- 
posited with the same society. 

Let us contrast for a moment 
the spacious halls of legislation and conveniences of the Xew 
State House with the confined limits of the Old, and let John 
Adams describe the famous Council Chamber of the latter as 
he saw it in 1768. 

"The same glorious portraits of King Charles IL and King 
James II., to which might be added, and should be added, little 
miserable likenesses of Governor Winthrop, Governor Bradstreet, 
Governor Endicott, and Governor Belcher, hung up in obscure 
corners of the room. Lieutenant-Governor Hutchinson, Connnaniler- 
in-Chief in the alDsence of the Governor, nnist be placed at the head 
of the council talkie. Lieutenant-Colonel Dalrvniple, Connnander- 
in-Chief of his Majesty's military forces, taking rank of all his 
Majesty's counsellors, must be seated by the side of the Lieutenant- 
Governor and Commander-in-Chief of the province. Eight-and- 
twenty cotmsellors must be painted, all seated at the council-board. 
Let me see, what costume ? What was the fiishion of that day in 
the month of March 1 Large white wigs, English scarlet clotb 
cloaks, some of them with gold-laced hats, not on their heads, in- 
deed, m so august a presence, but on a table before them. Before 



speaker's desk, and winslow's chair. 



348 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

these illustrious personages appeared Samuel Adams, a member of 
the House of Representatives, and their clerk, now at the head of 
the great assembly at the Old South Church. Thucydides, Livy, 
or Sallust would make a speech for him, or perhaps the Italian 
Botta, if he had known anything of this transaction, one of the most 
important of the Revolution ; but I am wholly incapable of it ; 
and if I had vanity enough to think myself capable of it, should not 
dare to attempt it." 

The portraits referred to by the venerable writer were full 
lengths, attributed to Vandyke, but evidently erroneously, as 
these monarchs were minors when Vandyke died. Governor 
Pownall, in whose time they were sent over, placed them in 
some obscure corner, wbere they remained until Governor 
Bernard discovered and mounted them in elegant frames, and 
hung them in the Council Chamber. 

In the State Library is a fine original portrait of General 
Gage, presented to the State by General W. H. Sumner, be- 
tween whom and the British general's wife it will be remem- 
bered a relationship existed. The last of the royal governors 
is separated from fellowship with his illustrious predecessors. 

Suspended from the ceiling of the Representatives' Chamber 
is the ancient symbol of Massachusetts, the codfish, which has 
been a greater source of wealth than the mines of California. 
The same fish, which the reader may see upon one of the 
colony stamps we have represented in a previous chapter, hung 
in the old hall in State Street, but was taken down, and was 
not restored until after the peace, when, on the motion of John 
Rowe, it was again disp ayed before the assembled wisdom of 
the Commonwealth. 

John Davis, the intrepid navigator of Queen Elizabeth's 
reign, was on our coast in 1585, in search of a northwest pas- 
sage, and records his experience of the great schools of codfish 
he encountered. Davis discovered the well-known straits to 
which his name has ever since been applied. He says : — 

" Wee beeing vnprouided of fishing furniture, with a long spike 
nayle made a hoke, and fastening the same to one of our sounding 
lynes Before the bayte was changed wee tooke more than fortie 
great cods, the fishe swimming so abomidantly thicke about our 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 



349 



7^ 



barke as is incredible to be reported of, which, -with a small portion 
of salte that wee had, wee preserued some thirtie couple, or there 
aboutes, and soe returned for England." 

The summit of Beacon Hill, on which stood the ancient 
Pharos of Boston, is intersected by Temple Street, named for 
Sir John Temple, who married a daughter of Governor Bowdoin. 
A portion of the elevation comes witliin 
the Reservoir site, and the houses south 
of it. The tract owned by the town 
was only six rods square, with a way 
of thirty feet leading to it. This "was 
sold to John Hancock and Samuel 
Spear in 1811, when the action of the 
abutters in digging down the hill ren- 
dered it untenable. On the top of this 
grassy mound was erected the Beacon, 
shown in all the early plans of the town. 
It was a tall mast standing on cross tim- 
bers placed upon a stone foundation, 
and supported by braces. Treenails were 
driven through the mast by wliicli it was 
ascended ; and near the top projected a 
crane of iron sixty-five feet from the base, 
upon which was suspended an iron skele- 
ton frame, designed to receive a barrel of 
tar, or other combustibles. This recep- 
tacle was placed at an altitude of more 
than two hundred feet from the sea level, 

and could be seen, when fired, for a great distance inland. Its 
object was to alarm the country in case of invasion. This 
beacon was erected about 1634-35, the town having ordered 
it set up on Gentry Hill in this year, with a Avatch of one 
person, to give the signal on the approach of danger. It was 
newly erected in 1768, having fallen from some cause un- 
known. In November, 1789, the beacon was blown down. 

Following the primitive signal spar, a monument of brick, 
sixty feet in height and four in diameter, was erected, in 1 790, 




^5^_=^: 



150 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



to the memory of those who fell at Bunker Hill. Charles 
Bulhnch was the designer. It was a plain Doric shaft, raised 
on a pedestal of stone and brick, eight 
feet high. The outside was encrusted 
with cement ; and on the top was a 
large gilded eagle of wood, supporting 
the American Arms. After the fall of 
the old beacon, Governor Hancock of- 
fered to erect another at his own cost, 
but the movement for an obelisk being 
already on foot, the projDosal was with- 
drawn, and the selectmen proceeded to 
lay out the hill for the monument. The 
monument was taken down and the 
hill levelled in 1811. It stood very 
near the southeast corner of the Reser- 
voir, Temple Street passing directly 
over its position. The earth which 
formed the cone was deposited in the 
Millpond, making a future foundation 
for the Lowell and Eastern Railroad 
stations. The tablets of slate bore in- 
scriptions written by the architect, 




MONUMENT. 



Charles Bulfinch, as follows : — 



ON THE SOUTH SIDE. 

To Commemorate 

the train of events 

which led 

to the American Revolution 

and finally secured 

Liberty and Independence 

to the United States, 

this column is erected 

by the voluntary contributions 

of the citizens 

of Boston 
M.D.CCXC. 



ON THE EAST SIDE. 

Americans 

Wliile from tliis eminence 

Scenes of luxuriant fertility 

of flourishing commerce 

and the abodes of social happiness 

meet your view, 

Forjjet not those 

Avho by their exertions 

Have secured to you 

these blessiuLrs. 



A TOUR ROUND THE CO^rMOX. 351 

ON THE WEST SIDE. 

Stamp Act passed 1765. Repealed 1766. 

Board of Customs established, 1767 

British troops fired on the inhabitants of Boston 

March 5, 1770 

Tea Act passed 1773. Tea destroyed in Boston, December 16. 

Port of Boston shut and guarded June 1, 177.4. 

General Congress at Philadelphia Sept. 5 

Battle at Lexington, April 19, 1775. 

Battle at Bunker Hill, June 17. 

Washington took command of the army July 2. 

Boston evacuated, March 17, 1776. 

Independence declared by Congress, 

Hancock President, July 4. 

ON THE NORTH SIDE. 

Capture of the Hessians at Trenton, Dec. 26, 1776 

Capture of the Hessians at Bennington, Aug. 16, 1777 

Capture of the British army at Saratoga, Oct. 17. 

Alliance with France Feb. 6, 1778. 

Confederation of the United States formed, 

Bowdoin President of Convention, 1780. 

Capture of the British army at York, Oct. 19, 1781 

Preliminaries of Peace Nov. 30, 1782 

Definitive Treaty of Peace Sept. 10, 1783 

Federal Constitution formed, Sept. 17, 1787 

And Ratified by the United States, 1787 to 1790. 

New Congress assembled at New York, April 6, 1790. 

Washington inaugurated President, Ai)ril 30. 

Public Debt funded, August 4, 1790. 

The base of the monument was enclosed by a railing, with 
benches for the use of pilgrims to the spot. A view, e(|ualle(l 
only by that now to be obtained from the lantern of the State 
House, well repaid a breathless scramble up the steep acclivity. 
On the Derne Street side a flight of wooden steps conducted 
part way up the eminence, but, after that, the explorer had to 
avail himself of the foot-holes worn by other visitors, until he 
reached a space fifty feet square on the sumuiit. On all sides, 
except the north, the contour of the ground was perfect ; there 
it had been encroached upon, in 17G4, to a degree endangering 
the elevation, by one Thomas Ilodscm. The town, by a com- 
mittee, remonstrated with Hodson, but to no purpose, although 
Thomas Hancock and James Otis, Esqrs., were of the delegation. 



352 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

The contumacious Hodson persisted in digging gravel on his lot, 
and the committee were obliged to content themselves with a 
recommendation to employ the intervention of the General Court. 

No account appears that the original beacon was ever used, 
but when the troops were momentarily expected in 1768, the 
Bostonians prepared it for firing, to give the intelligence to the 
country. Governor Bernard waxed very wroth at this presump- 
tion, and sent Sheriff Greenleaf to remove the tar-barrel which 
the Sons of Liberty had placed in the skillet. " Matters now," 
wrote the governor, '' exceeded all former exceedings." 

In 1865 the Legislature authorized the rebuilding of Beacon 
Hill Monument by the Bunker Hill Monument Association, 
they to receive the tablets now in the custody of the Common- 
wealth. To Mr. R. C. Winthrop is said to belong the credit 
of the suggestion, as yet not carried out. 

Mt. Vernon Street was formerly called Sumner Street as far 
as Belknap ; beyond this it was Olive Street. The whole was 
then called Sumner, and, in -1833, by its present name. Han- 
cock was George Street ; Bowdoin, like Hancock, named for the 
governor, was first Middlecott Street. As early as 1722 only 
a narrow pathway prolonged Beacon Street across the Hancock 
pasture, around the base of Beacon Hill. To this the name of 
Davie's Lane was given. Beacon Street then terminated at the 
Almshouse. 

Besides the ropewalks mentioned west of Hancock Street, 
there was one east of it, which became the property of the 
State by purchase. This rope walk-site now forms the westerly 
side of the Reservoir. A long ropewalk, coinciding nearly with 
the line of Belknap Street, is upon the earliest map ; ropemak- 
ing was an important industry of Old Boston, especially of the 
westerly portion of it. 

Succeeding to the old gambrel-roofed Almshouse came the 
stately edifice at the corner of Park and Beacon Streets, chiefly 
remarkable as having been the house in which Lafayette so- 
journed during his visit to Boston in 1824. It was erected by 
Thomas Amory, before 1800, for his residence, its site commanding 
a beautiful view of the Common, but was later divided into four 



A TOUR ROUND THE COMMON. 



353 



Hon. Sam- 




dwellings. In 1 art of this mansion resided Christopher Gore, 
during the year he was governor of Massachusetts. Fisher 
Ames, who died July 4, 1808, was buried from this house. 
The funeral services took place at King's Chapel, 
uel Dexter pro- 
nounced his eu- _. _ ^- —-=[ - 
logy. It was 
later tenanted 
by George Tick- 
nor, the distin- 
guished scholar, 
oue of the found- 
ers of the Public 
Library, and au- 
thor of the His- 
tory of Spanish 
Literature. 

Before the di- 
vision of the 

building, it was kept as a fashionable boarding-house by Mrs. 
Carter, until she removed to the present Howard Street, These 
boarding-houses were, before the erection of the Tremont House, 
the resort of strangers visiting Boston. 

Edward G. Malbone, the celebrated portrait-painter, had his 
studio there. He accompanied Allston to Europe, and was 
urged by West to remain, but preferred returning to the United 
States. Malbone excelled in miniature-painting. 

Samuel Dexter was a resident in that part of the house front- 
ing on Beacon Street. A Bostonian and a Harvard man, Mr. 
Dexter was one of the greatest lawyers Massachusetts ever had. 
Judge Story said of him that he never descended to finesse or 
cunning before a jury ; Webster, that his statements were argu- 
ments. He served in both houses of Congress ; in tlie upper 
branch during the exciting times of the troul)k's witli the French 
Bepublic. He was successively Secretary of War and of the 
Treasury, under Mr. Adams, and for a time acting Secretary of 
State. In politics Mr. Dexter was a stanch Federalist, but sup- 



LAFA-iLlFL-, I1I.-,[DEXCE. 



354 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 

ported tlie war of 1812. He was first president of the first 
temperance society funned in Massachusetts. The accomplished 
scholar, Lucius M. Sargent, studied law with Mr. Dexter. 

After Mr. Dexter, the building was used — not too success- 
fully — as a club-house. It was rented by Mr. Quincy, when 
mayor of Boston, for the use of Lafayette, during the week he 
was the guest of the city. 

Lafayette, in order to redeem his pledge to be in Boston at a 
stated time, had to ride forty miles at night, arriving at Dedham 
at midnight. His meeting with Governor Eustis, with whom 
he had been acquainted in the old Eevolutionary army, was ex- 
tremely interesting, the governor exclaiming, " I am the hap- 
piest man that ever lived." 

The General was escorted from the residence of Governor 
Eustis, in Roxbury, into town, by a cavalcade which conducted 
him to the city limits, where he was received by the city au- 
thorities. He proceeded, under a military escort, to the head 
of the maU on Tremont Street, where the scholars of the public 
schools were drawn up to receive him. All accounts agree that 
on no occasion were there ever so many people in Boston before. 
After paying his respects to the governor and Council in the 
Senate Chamber, the General was conveyed to his lodgings. A 
handsome arch was thrown over "Washington Street, at the site 
of the old fortifications, with this inscription written on the 
spur of the moment the day previous by the poet Sj^rague : — 

■" Welcome, Lafayette ! 
The fathers in glory shall sleep, 

That gathered with thee to the fight, 
But the sons will eternally keep 

The tablet of gratitude bright. 
We bow not the neck, and we bend not the knee ; 
But our hearts, Lafayette, we surrender to thee." 

Another arch was erected on the site of the Old Liberty 
Stump, opposite Boylston Market. Lafayette rode, uncovered, 
in the barouche with Mr. Quincy, bowing incessantly to the 
multitudes that pressed around him. A scene of great interest 
occurred when the General appeared on the balcony of the man- 
sion he was to occupy. On either side of liim were Governor 



A TOUK ROUND THE COMMON. 355 

Eustis and ex-Governor Brooks, clad in their old Continental 
uniforms. These two, brothers in arms, had buried an old 
animosity to greet the noble Frenchman, — a circumstance 
known to and ajDplauded by many. The Boston Regiment, 
which had escorted the General, passed in review ; and, amid 
the cheers of thousands of spectators, the General and his dis- 
tinguished companions withdrew. 

A dinner was given to Lafayette at the Exchange Coffee 
House on the 27th, at which, after the company had partakcm 
of an elegant repast provided by Colonel Hamilton, the General 
gave the following toast : — • 

" The city of Boston, the cradle of Liberty ; may Faneiiil Hall 
ever stand a monument to teach the world that resistance to ojjpres- 
sion is a duty, and will, under true republican mstitutions, l)ec(jme 
a blessing." 

The General made a visit to the battle-ground of Bunker 
Hill, also to the IS^avy Yard, where he was welcomed by Com- 
modore Bainbridge. He passed an evening at ^Mrs. Llov<rs, 
lady of Senator Lloyd, at their residence in Somerset Street. 
He also visited Governor Eustis at Boxbury, and Governor 
Brooks at Medford, where, in allusion to the ex-governor, an 
arch was erected near the meeting-house with the inscrip- 
tion : — 

'* General Lafayette, 
Welcome to our hills and Brooks." 

He attended divine service on Sunday at Brattle Street, 
where he heard Dr. Palfrey, and in the afternoon went to 
Quincy to dine with the venerable John Adams. " Tliat was 
not the John Adams T remember," said the General, sadly, after- 
wards. "That was not the Lafayette I remember," said the 
patriarch after the meeting.* Both had changed, the ex-Presi- 
dent was verging on ninety, and the General sixty-seven ; Mr. 
Adams died in 182G, Lafayette in 1834. 

On Monday, August 30, a grand military review took ]daco 

on the Common. The troops were under the command of 

Major-General Crane. The Cadets escorted General Lafayette 

from his lodgings to the State House, thence to the Common, 

*' Life of Quincy. 



356 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

where the governor and other officers of the Commonwealth 
were assembled. About six thousand troops took part in the 
review, Generals Lyman and Appleton commanding brigades. 
Dinner was served in an immense marquee, to which more than 
twelve hundred guests sat down. In the evening the General 
gave a levee at his residence which was thronged by all classes, 
the Marquis bestowing particular attention on every individual 
of humble appearance or advanced age. 

Lafayette enjoyed his visit to Boston highly. He was cheered 
to the eclio whenever he went abroad, and the corner of Park 
Street was seldom deserted. One day, when he returned from 
some excursion with the mayor, there was a great crowd to see 
him alight. He turned to the mayor and said, "Mr. Quincy, 
were you ever in Europe *?" "No, General." "Then," said 
Lafayette, "you cannot understand the dilterence between a 
crowd in Europe and here in Boston ; why, I should imagine 
the people of your city were a picked population out of the 
whole human race." 

General Lafliyette's first visit to Boston was in 1778, with 
D'Estaing. He was next here in 1780, when he returned from 
a trip to France, where he had been to transact some business.^ 
He remembered perfectly the persons who had received him on 
that occasion, — when he landed from the frigate Hermione at 
Hancock's wharf, — and whom he had visited. On his second 
visit he Avas accompanied by his son and by M. Levasseur. The 
people of America will not soon forget their generous and gal- 
lant ally, who asked permission to serve as a volunteer in the 
American army. Brandywine, where he was wounded, and the 
trenches of Yorktown, alike attest his valor. He has no monu- 
ment ; but paper, even more durable than marble, furnishes 
us with records like this : — 

" Head-quarters Oct. 15th, 1781. 

For to-morrow. 

M. G. M. La Fayette, 

B. G. Mulileiil)urg and 

Haynes' brigade. 

Maj. gen. La Fayette's division will mount the trenches to-morrow." 



A TOUR FtOUXD THE COMMON. 357 

It was at Yorktown that the Marquis, with his American 
Light Division, stormed the enemy's river-battery, while Laron 
Yiomenil, "v\ath the French grenadiers and. chasseurs, assauUed 
another important work on the extreme left. The Americans, 
with the ]\Iar(|uis at their head, succeeded in capturing tlieir 
redoubt first, when Lafayette sent his aid. Major Barbour, to 
the Baron with the message, " I am in my redoubt ; where are 
you 1 " The Baron, who was waiting for his men to clear away 
the abattis, returned answer, " I am not in mine, but will be in 
live minutes." A touching incident of his visit connected with 
this exploit is related by Mr. Quincy : — 

" On the day of his arrival an old soldier would press through the 
crowd in the State House, and cried out, ' You don't remember me, 
General ; but I was close to you when we stormed our redoubt at 
Yorktown. I was just behind Captain Smith. You remember Cap- 
tain Smith 1 He was shot through the head as he mounted the 
redoubt.' ' Ah yes, yes ! I rememl>er,' returned Lafayette. * Poor 
Captain Smith ! But we beat the French I ive beat the French ! ' " 

Next below the residence of ]\Ir. Ticknor on Park Street 
was that of Hon. Abbott Lawrence. Farther down is that of 
Josiah Quincy, Jr., the second mayor of that name. His ad- 
ministration will be remembered for the introduction of the 
Cochituate water, — a measure strenuously urged by his father 
twenty years before its accomplishment. The event was cele- 
brated with military and civic displays, and an immense nndti- 
tude thronged the Common to see the water let on fur the lirst 
time. 

At the corner of Beacon and Mt. Yernon Streets was the 
residence of William Molineux, one of the early patriots and a 
prominent merchant. He built a splendid mansion for liis day, 
but died in 1774. ^Ir. Molineux was one of the famous com- 
mittee that demanded of Governor Hutchinson the immediate 
removal of the troops after the ]\Iassacre. His colleagues were 
Adams (Samuel), Hancock, AYarren, l^hiUips, Hensliaw, and 
Pemberton. John Adams relates, as an amusing incident, that 
Molineux was obliged to march side by side with tlie com- 
mander of some of the troops, to protect them from the iiidig- 



358 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

nation of the people, in their progress to the wharf, from which 
they were to embark for the Castle. 

As the agent of Charles Ward Apthorp, Mr. Molineux rented 
the stores belonging to the former, on Wheelwright's wharf, for 
barracks. The estate of Molineux seems to have passed to Mr. 
Apthorp, for we find it confiscated as such by the Common- 
wealth. In 1782 it became the residence of Daniel Denison 
Eogers. 

Having completed our circuit of the Common, we may ven- 
ture the remark that its beauty, as a park, is surpassed by the 
value of its historical associations. 

We have seen that part of the forces which captured Louis- 
burg were assembled and organized here ; that the troops which 
conquered Quebec were recruited and probably brigaded here by 
Amherst ; that it was the mustering-place for the conflicts which 
ushered in the American Revolution ; and the fortified camp 
which held the beleaguered town in subjection. 

It is associated with the deep horrors of Quaker executions ; 
with the eloquence of Whitefield, which paved the way for 
many eminent divines after him to address the people under 
the " Cathedral trees." It has in all times been a place for 
pubhc rejoicings, for the celebration of our republican calendar 
days, or for martial displays. 

The repeal of the Stamp Act was celebrated in Boston on 

the lOtli May, 1766, as no event was ever observed before. 

Daybreak was ushered in with music, 

the beating of drums, and firing of 

small-arms. The guns of the Castle 

proclaimed the joyful intelligence, 

which was taken up and echoed by 

the town batteries. In the evening 

an obelisk, which had been erected 

on the Common, was illuminated 

with two hundred and eighty lamps. 

REPEAL OBELISK. Thcrc was a general illumination. 

Hancock's mansion was brilliant with lights, and in front of 

the house a stage was built from which fireworks were exliib- 




A TUUU KOUND THE COMMON. 



359 



ited. The Sons of Liberty had erected a similar stage in front 
of the AYorkliouse, from whicli they answered the display at 
the Hancock House. Under this hospitable roof were enter- 
tained " the genteel part of the Town," while the crowd outside 
were treated with a pipe of wine. 

The obelisk was intended to be placed under Liberty Tree, 
but was con- ^,^ ^^^_ 




sumed the night 
of the celebra- 
tion. Xext above 
the pedestal were 
allegorical figures 
on each of the 
sides, symboliz- 
ing the condition 
of the colony 
from the enact- 
ment to the re- 
peal of the Stamp 

Act. AVe give a America in distress. 

copy of an engraving, by Paul Eevere, reproducing one of the 
sides. 

Accident alone prevented the Common being the scene of a 
sanguinary struggle between the royal and American forces. 
"When Washington occupied Dorchester Heights, he confidently 
expected an attack from Howe, and had prei)ared a counter- 
stroke. Two divisions, under Putnam, were to attack the town. 
Sullivan, with one, was to assault the works on Beacon Hill, 
Greene, Avith the other, was to carry the post at Barton's Point, 
and make his way to a junction with Sullivan. Greene was 
well qualified for the task assigned him, having been in lioston 
two years before, and seen the lines on the Common. Provi- 
dence arrested the purpose of Howe, and the town was entered 
without a shot being fired. 

Hancock has the credit of first introducing music upon the 
Common for the benefit of the people. He caused a band to 
play in front of his dwelling, paid for by himself. In former 



360 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

times booths and stands for the sale of refresliments were 
erected along Paddock's and the Great Mall, ultimately em- 
bracing all four sides of the Common. 

Lord Harris, who was captain of the grenadier company of 
the Fifth Foot, Percy's regiment, wrote home, in 1774, '' Oui 
camp is pitched in an exceedingly pleasant situation on the 
gentle descent of a large common, hitherto the property of the 
Bostonians, and used for the purpose of grazing their cows, 
which now, poor creatures, often attempt to force their way 
into their old pastures, where the richest herbage I ever saw 
abounds." 

Lord Harris relates an instance of a cow impahng herself on 
a range of firelocks with the bayonets on, going off with one 
sticking in her side. Harris's company was at Lexington. At 
Bunker Hill he received a wound in the head, falling senseless 
into the arms of his lieutenant, Lord Eawdon. 

Pubhc executions occurred occasionally on the Common until 
1812, when the park was rescued from these legalized exhibi- 
tions. It ceased to be a common grazing-field under the elder 
Quincy in 1830, dangerous accidents having occurred to prom- 
enaders. If a mere handful of settle-rs more than two centu- 
ries ago allotted fifty acres for the common benefit, a quarter 
of a million jpeople can well afford to preserve it. 



VALLEY ACRE, BOWLING GREEN, AND WEST BOSTON. 3G1 



CHAPTEE XII. 

VALLEY ACRE, THE BOWLING GREEX, AND WEST BOSTON. 

Governor Bowdoiu. — General Burgoyne. — Boston Society in 17S2. — David 
Hinckley's Stone Houses. — James Lloyd. — Lafayette. — Daniel Davis. — 
Admiral Davis. — Historic Genealogical Society. — Valley Acre. — Uriah 
Cottiiig. — Governor Eustis. — Anecdote of Governor Brooks. — Millerite 
Tabernacle. — Howard Atlienseum. — Bowling Green. — Old Boston Physi- 
cians. — Charles Bulfinch. — New Fields. — Peter Cliardon. — Mrs. Pel- 
ham. — Peter Pelham. — Thomas Melvill. — Dr. William Jenks. — Captain 
Gooch. — West Church. — Leverett Street Jail. — Poor Debtors. — Alms- 
house. — Massachusetts General Hospital. — Medical College. — National 
and Eagle Theatres. 

GOVEEXOR JAMES BOWDOIX lived on Beacon Street, 
near the corner of the street named for him, the liouse 
being situated at some distance back from the street, with a high 
flight of stone steps leading up to it. The family name of the 
governor was Baudoin. Frequent mention is made in these 
pages of prominent events or institutions with which the name 
of Governor Bowdoin is connected. He was chief magistrate 
of Massachusetts from 1785 - 87, and Shays's Rebellion occurri'd 
under his administration. It was vigorously suppressed by 
Bowdoin, to whose aid the officers of the old army (piickly 
rallied. This was the dark period of our history. The old 
Articles of Confederation were entirely inadetpiate to carry on 
the government. 'No taxes could be levied without the consent 
of all the States, and the central government Avas hkely to fall 
to pieces for want of the means to carry it on. Public and 
private credit shared the general wreck. 

At this crisis the rebellion of Shays broke out. General 
Lincoln commanded the State forces, with Generals Brooks and 
Cobb to support him. The outlu-oak was cnished with little 
bloodshed, and the authority of the laws restored. Bowdoiii's 
popularity was impaired by this affair, and he lost his election in 
16 



362 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

1787. He was a sufferer from consumption, and finally suc- 
cumbed to its attacks. 

General Burgoyne occupied the Bowdoin mansion in 1775; 
at the same time Clinton resided in that of Governor Hancock. 
These two chiefs overlooked the forces on the Common, and had 
particular charge of the defences of West Boston. The man- 
sion in after times became the boarding-house of Mrs. Delano. 

Next, to the eastward, was the residence of William Phil- 
lips, Senior, — a fine old pre - Eevolutionary mansion, ap- 
proached by several flights of stone steps. It stood on the 
hill, at a higher elevation than the Bowdoin or Sears houses on 
either side of it, the summit being considerably higher than the 
house-tops now in Ashburton Place. Some noble trees stand- 
ing on the estate formed a landmark for approaching vessels, — 
they were cut down for fuel by the British. This estate be- 
longed successively to Samuel Sewall and Edward Bromfield. 
Preeman Place Chapel was erected on the site. 

What the society of Beacon Street and its vicinity was in 
the last century may be gathered from the testimony of a keen 
observer of that period. 

Count Segur says that " Boston affords a proof that democ- 
racy and luxury are not incompatible, for in no part of the 
United States is so much comfort or a more agreeable society to 
be found. Europe does not offer, to our admiration, women 
adorned with greater beauty, elegance, education, or more bril- 
liant accomplishments than the ladies of Boston, such as Mes- 
dames Smith, Tudor, Jervis, and Morton." M. de Chastellux 
also pays suitable acknowledgments to the Boston ladies, like 
a gallant Frenchman ; while both unite in eulogy of Adams, 
Hancock, Dr. Cooper, and other leading spirits it was their 
fortune to meet. 

The two stone houses at the easterly corner of Beacon and 
Somerset Streets, now, while we write, undergoing such strange 
manipulations, were erected soon after the war of 1812 by 
David Hinckley. They were, at that time, the handsomest 
private residences in Boston, and were occupied successively by 
citizens distinguished in financial or commercial pursuits, until 



VxVLLEY ACRE, BOWLING GREEN, AND WEST BOSTON. 303 

tliey became the Somerset Club House. They liave lately passed 
iuto tlie hands of the Aiuericaii Congregational Association. 

Connected with one house is a domestic tragedy, which can 
now affect no one by repetition. An Italian, named Perodi, 
w^ho was the French teacher of a daughter of Mr. Hinckley, 
availed himself of the opportunity to secure the young lady's 
affections. This, coming to the knowledge of her friciidp, 
resulted in an interview, at which Perodi advanced pretensions 
to rank and position in the old country by documents after- 
wards alleged to be forged. The denouement occasioned the 
absence of Perodi for a time ; but Jie returned, and, ascertain- 
ing that the object of his pursuit was then living in Somerset 
Place (Allston Street), repaired thither, entered the house un- 
perceived, ascended the stairs to the lady's apartment, and, being 
discovered, stabbed himself with a poniard. 

Mr. Hinckley took down an old stone house situated on his 
lot, considered the oldest, of stone, in Boston. It was built by 
Eev. James Allen of the First Church, and was occupied by his 
descendants until about 1806, one of whom, Jeremiah Allen, 
was high sheriff of Suffolk. 

Proceeding onward through Somerset Street, modo j^^dextri, 
we pass the First Baptist Church, Ashburton Place, formerly 
Somerset Court, Pemberton Square, now a mere crater of the 
old hill, and pause before a double brick mansion, with arched 
doorway, now a hotel under the sign of the " Somerset House." 

This house was built by Hon. James Lloyd after Somerset 
Street was laid out, and opened at the back upon the gardens 
of his father's estate, which extended up the hill beside that of 
Gardiner Greene. The elder Lloyd was a very distinguished 
physician ; Drs. Joseph Warren, John Jeffries, Isaac Pand, and 
John Clarke were students with him. He was for some time 
surgeon at the Castle, and had a fine old residence on Tiviiiont 
Row. 

His son was in the United States Senate in 1808-13, during 
a most exciting period. A Bostonian by birth, he liad been 
active in mercantile affairs before engaging in political life. 
Lafayette became his guest in tliis house in 1825. During this 



364 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

sojourn the Marquis paid visits to Daniel Webster, John Ad- 
ams, at Quincy, General Hull, at the residence of ^Ir. McLellan 
in Wintlirop Place, where he met his old companions in arms, 
Generals Cobb, Huntington, Colonel Putnam, and others. He 
also visited General Dearborn and Hon. T. L. Winthrop, Mrs. 
Ticknor, in Tremont Street, Madam Humphries, v^^idow of his 
old comrade General Humphries, in Mt. Vernon Street, and 
attended a party given in his honor by Mayor Quincy. 

A public dinner was given to Lafayette at the Marlborough 
Hotel, at which were present the Secretary of War, Governor, 
and Lieutenant-Governor, Hons. Messrs. Phillips, Lloyd, and 
Webster, the veteran Colonel McLane, and others. Odes were 
delivered on this occasion by Charles Sprague and Colonel 
Everett. The General went afterwards to the Boston Theatre, 
where he listened to a complimentary address from Miss Powell, 
and witnessed the play of Charles II., with Finn, Kilner, etc., 
in the cast. 

The two buildings on the opposite side of the street, one of 
which is used by the Historic Genealogical Society, were built 
by Daniel Davis, a lawyer of some prominence in the District 
of Maine, who removed to Boston in 1804. As a barrister, his 
talents were not, perhaps, conspicuous at a bar where Otis, Mor- 
ton, and their peers practised, but he had the faculty of grasp- 
ing the points of a case in the court-room, and constructing his 
argument as the trial progressed. He was appointed Solicitor- 
General by Governor Strong, — an office created expressly for 
him, as, in 1767, it had been for Jonathan Sewall. Perez Mor- 
ton was at the same time Attorney-General. 

Eear- Admiral Charles H. Davis is the son of Daniel Davis, 
and was born in the most southerly of the two houses. Admiral 
Davis is best known as victor in the engagement with the 
rebel fleet before Memphis, Tenn., in June, 1862. His scientific 
labors in connection with the naval service have been of great 
value. He was with Dupont in the expedition which captured 
Port Eoyal, with Farragut below Vicksburg, and in the expedi- 
tion up the Yazoo. While engaged in the coast survey he dis- 
covered several dangerous shoals off" Nantucket, in the track of 
vessels bound into New York. 



VALLEY ACRE, BOWLING GREEN, AND WEST B(JSTON. 3G5 

The Xew England Historic Genealogical Society occupies tho 
northerly house, — a hamlsome and well-arranged Iniilding. 
The local histories and family genealogies of Xew England are 
the objects upon which the society has been founded. For an 
antiquarian association it is eminently progressive, — a circum- 
stance that accounts for its rise and progress among older insti- 
tutions of its kind. Its collections, open to every student, are 
made available through the exertions and interest of its officers 
in every department of historical research. The collections and 
publications of the society have stimulated the writing of town 
histories, so that what was once a hopeless labor may be inves- 
tigated in a brief period and with system. 

The society had its beginning in 1844, with five gentlemen 
well known in antiquarian circles, namely, Charles Ewer, 
Samuel G. Drake, W. H. Montague, J. Wingate Thornton, and 
Lemuel Shattuck. Mr. Ewer, an old Boston bookseller, was 
the first president. He deserves honorable mention as the pro- 
jector of the South Cove improvement and the opening of 
Avon Street. In 1845 the society was incorporated. 

This elegant building, which was dedicated in 1871, cost 
about $ 40,000, and was entirely paid for by subscriptions 
among members and others, raised chiefly through the instru- 
mentality of its president, Hon. Marshall P. AVilder. It con- 
tains 9,000 volumes, 25,000 pamphlets, and a large collection 
of manuscripts and curiosities, whicli, being wholly germane to 
the field in which the society labors, form a unitpie and vahia- 
ble library. 

Valley Acre was a name anciently applied to the valley lying 
between Pemberton and Beacon Hills, now intersected l)y Som- 
erset and Bulfinch Streets, and reaching to the low ground 
below. The name was retained until about the present century, 
or until tlie disappearance of the hills upon eitlier side deprived 
it of significance. 

Farther down Somerset Street we jiass the substantial, com- 
fortable-looking residences of Messrs. Webster and Cot ting, and 
of Dr. Jackson, whose name is associated with the ether dis- 
covery. The Sultan sent a decoration to Dr. Jackson, whoso 



366 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

claims to be the discoverer of the great anaesthetic were disputed 
by Dr. Morton, the weight of public opinion favoring the latter. 
We have in the Public Garden a monument dedicated to the 
discovery, whereon one may seek in vain for the name of him 
who has conferred such incalculable benefit upon the human race. 

It will scarcely be credited that a discovery fraught with such 
important consequences as was that of applying ether in sur- 
gical operations could not be announced in a Boston newspaper 
until the discoverer sent to the office of publication a paid 
advertisement. Yet this actually happened less than thirty 
years ago. Ether was first administered by Dr. W. T. G. Mor- 
ton, at his office, 19 Tremont Eow, now Street, about opposite 
the northerly end of the Museum, September 30, 1846. The 
value of the discovery was at first more readily appreciated 
abroad than at home, 

Mr. Cotting, notwithstanding the gigantic enterprises he con- 
ducted, in consequence of reverses during the M^ar of 1812, died 
in straitened circumstances. To his genius Boston owes the 
inauguration of an era of improvement begun against the tradi- 
tional and conservative jDolicy of the citizens generally. By 
dint of indomitable energy and perseverance he succeeded in 
realizing most of his designs, and, had he lived, would have 
worthily continued what he had so well began. Besides the 
distinguished occupants of the Webster mansion mentioned was 
William Eopes, an eminent merchant connected with the Eus- 
sian trade. 

Dr. William Eustis, who succeeded John Brooks as governor 
of Massachusetts in 1824, found his residence in Eoxbury — 
he lived in the old Shirley mansion — too distant from the 
State House, during sessions of the General Court, and, in the 
winter of 1825, took lodgings with Mrs. Miles, the successor 
of Mrs. Carter, in Howard Street. The house stood where the 
Howard Athen?eum is. Here he soon fell ill and died, being 
buried from this house on the 12th of February with military 
honors. The funeral services took place at the Old South, and 
the remains were placed in the Granary Burying Ground. Gov- 
ernor Eustis studied medicine under Joseph Warren ; he served 



VALLEY ACKE, BOWLING GKEEX, AND WEST BOSTON. 367 

as surgeon in the Revolutionary army, and, at its conclusion, 
took a residence in Sudbury Street, and commenced a practice, 
lie served two terms as member of Congress, and held other 
offices under the State. 

General Sumner relates of him some interesting reminis- 
cences. He says : — 

" I remember one occasion particularly, Avhen I was invited to the 
governor's table to a dinner given in compliment to Lord Stanley, 
Lord Wortley, and M. Labouchiere. The latter gentleman, in his 
visit to Boston, was so impressed with the beauty and execution of 
AUston's picture of Elijah in the Wilderness, that he purchased it 
of the painter at the price of a thousand dollars. 

" Brooks and Eustis, two old cronies of the Revolution, about the 
time of Lafayette's reception, in 1824, were on unfriendly terms. 
The difference was caused by the election of Brooks as PrL'sident of 
the Society of the Cincinnati, a vacancy having occurred while 
Eustis was vice-president and absent from the country. The friends 
of both exerted themselves to bring about a reconciliation, and, an 
interview being arranged, the old friends did not embrace each 
other merely as old friends, but they shook hands so heartily, and 
the intercourse was so familiar, — the one calling the other * John,' 
and the other calling Eustis ' Doctor,' and sometimes ' Bill,' — that 
they parted with as friendly feelings as had existed between them at 
any period.' " 

L^pon the spot where stands the Howard Athen.Tum was 
built, during the excitement of 1843-44, a huge wooden struc- 
ture, dignified with the name of " Tabernacle." Here the dis- 
ciples of the prophet Miller awaited the day of ascension, amid 
scenes that beggar description. The interior was hung Anth 
pictures representing the monsters of the Book of Revelation, 
in which the artist had drawn freely upon imaginati<ui to de- 
pict the grotesque and horrible. Frenzy seemed to hold pos- 
session of the worsliippers at this temple ; many disposed of 
all their worldly goods, the reason of others was affected, and 
the whole city was agitated almost beyond belief, until the day 
fixed for the end of all things human came and went like 
other days. An error of calculation had been made by the 
prophet, but his deluded congregation dissolved silently and 
ingloriously. 



368 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

It is related that in biiildinc^ the front wall on Howard 
Street due regard was not had to safety, and that it had a 
decided leaning outwards. The mayor's attention being called 
to the fact, he expostidated with the builders, who replied, 
" that it made but little difference as the world itself would 
last but a few days at the most." The mayor, Martin Brim- 
mer, compelled them to rebuild the wall in question, observing 
that they might incline it so as to fall inward, but not out- 
wardly. Miller, the apostle of the sect, had been a soldier of 
1812, serving with distinction on the northern frontier with 
the rank of captain. 

The Tabernacle was next leased for theatrical ^performances, 
and under the hands of carpenters and painters underwent a 
speedy transformation. A new front, painted in imitation of 
freestone was erected, and the house received the name of 
the Howard Athenaeum. 

The first performance was on the night of October 13, 1845, 
when the " School for Scandal " was given. Messrs. Johnson, 
Ayling, Ford, and Brayley were the managers. Mr. James H. 
Hackett, since so famous for his impersonations of the "fat 
knight," made his first appearance in Boston at this house. 
In February, 1846, a few minutes after the closing of the 
theatre, fire was discovered issuing from it, and the theatre- 
tabernacle was speedily consumed. 

The present theatre was built in 1846, and was opened in 
October of that year under the control of Mr. Hackett. Isaiah 
Eogers was the architect. At this theatre Mr. AVilliam AVarren 
made his debut before a Boston audience as Sir Lucius O'Trig- 
ger, in the " liivals." The Yiennoise Children also appeared 
at the Howard, creating an unexampled furor. The house is 
further celebrated for the first representations of Italian opera 
in Boston by a company from Havana, who opened in April, " 
1847, with "Ernani," when the golden notes of Fortunata 
Tedesco first enraptured Bostonians. Blangy, the Ravels, IVIa- 
dame Anna Bishop, and other celebrities brought the theatre 
into high repute. Eliza Ostinelli made her first appearance on 
the stage at the Howard in " La Sonnambula." 



VALLEY ACRE, BOWLING GREEN, AND WEST BOSTON. 369 

This estate is further noted as the old-time habitation of 
Hon. James Pitts, a counsellor and mover of the address to 
General Gage. 

Valley Acre is not more obsolete tlian the old Bowling Green, 
upon which we have entered to find it changed to Bowdoin 
Sc^uare. Cambridge Street began in early times at Sudbury 
Street, extending along the green, and thence to the river. 
What is now the square fell away in a natural slope to the 
Mill Pond. The rest of the quarter known as "West Boston 
was very sparsely peopled. On a small eminence in the present 
neighborhood of the West Church was a windmill; rope- 
walks covered most of the neck known as Barton's Point, on 
one extremity of which were situated the copper-works, which 
gave their name to Copper, now Brighton Street. Across the 
point earthworks were thrown up in 1775. The greater part 
of the area west of Bowdoin Square was in its primitive con- 
dition of fields or pastures, and so remote was it considered 
from the centre of population, that the Province Hospital and 
Pest House was located near West Boston Bridge, on what is 
now Grove Street, from wliich the point was called " Pest 
House Point." 

Eighty odd years ago there were but three-and-twenty phy- 
sicians and surgeons in all Boston. Besides the honored names 
of Lloyd, Eand, Danforth, Eustis, Jarvis, Hayward, Homans, 
and Warren, there was Dr. Thomas Bulfinch in Bowdoin 
Square, father of Charles Bultinch, the distinguished architect. 

The impress of Mr. Bulfinch's genius is seen not only in his 
native city, but in the Capitol of the nation, which was planned 
by him after the destruction of the original by the British 
General Ross. Mr. Bulfinch's early taste for this branch of 
art was cultivated by travel in the Old World amid the works 
of Inigo Jones, Sir Christopher Wren, and tlie old masters of 
the Continent. Returning, he at once applied himself to the 
beautifying of his birthplace. Before his day there were but 
few public buildings that would attract the notice of a stranger. 
Architectural beauty was but little considered, mere adaptation 
to the purposes of the structure being all that the builder 
16* X 



370 LANDMARKS OF BOSTOX. 

attempted. The Beacon Hill Momimeiit, the Franklin Street 
Crescent, the new State House, introduced a new era, which 
Rogers and Willard, Bryant and Billings, have perpetuated. 

Of Mr. Bulfinch's public works the State House was indeed 
considered somewhat faulty in its proportion of length to 
height ; but it is stated that the original plan contemplated 
greater length to the wings, — departed from on economical 
grounds. Mr. Bulfinch was a Harvard man, graduating in the 
same class with Samuel Dexter and Judge John Davis. He was 
closely identified with the interests of the town, serving on the 
Board of Selectmen a period of twenty-two years, during nine- 
teen of which he was Chairman of the Board. 

Besides other works of which mention has been made, Mr. 
Bulfinch was architect of the State Prison, the Old City Hall, 
the Cathedral in Franklin Street, Federal Street Church and 
Theatre, the New South Church in Summer Street, the Mas- 
sachusetts General Hospital, Haymarket Theatre, and of the 
enlargement of Faneuil Hall. University Hall, at Cambridge, 
and numerous private residences, attest his industry and the 
general estimation in which his services were held. 

The names of the early dwellers in the " New Fields," as the 
pastures of West Boston were called, have or had their names 
reproduced in Allen, Buttolph, Middlecott, Bulfinch, Lynde, 
and Southack Streets. Garden and Grove were descriptive of 
points of rural beauty in Allen's pasture, as Avas Centre Street, 
of its equal division. Leverett is from the famous old Governor 
John, and Staniford and Chambers (part of which was called 
Wiltshire) and Belknap left their patronymics to those avenues. 
Cambridge Street terminated in a marsh, from which arose the 
northwest slope of Centinel Hill, the shore receding a consider- 
able distance from the line of Charles Street. The ropewalks 
referred to were situated upon and in the vicinity of Poplar 
Street. John Steel made bolt-rope, lines, and other cordage 
there in 1719. 

Before the work of demolition began in Bowdoin Square, it 
was the seat of many elegant old-time estates, with broad acres, 
gardens, and noble trees, of which but a solitary specimen 



VALLEY ACRE, BOWLING GREEN, AND WEST BOSTON. 371 

here and there is left. The Revere House, from which Web- 
ster harangued the citizens, is on the grounds and residence of 
Kirk Boott, whose son Kirk Boott was connected many years 
with the Lowell manufactures. The hotel is named for Paid 
Eevere, first president of the Mechanic Charitable Association, 
by which it was built. It has enjoyed the distinction of enter- 
taining President Fillmore, Jenny Lind, the Prince of Wales, 
and the Grand Duke Alexis of Russia. 

On the site of the Baptist Church, erected in 1840, was the 
dwelling of Theodore Lyman, Sr. The space in front of the 
church, once ornamented with trees and separated from the street 
by an iron fence, is at present utilized by a row of unsightly 
shops, between which one must pass to reach the church. The 
Coolidge and Parkman estates are covered with modern struc- 
tures, as is also that of Lieutenant-Governor Armstrong, on 
the corner opposite the Revere House. The two stone houses 
fronting the square were built by Samuel Parkman, father of 
Dr. George Parkman. The range of brick buildings, from 
Howard Street in the direction of Bulfinch, was the second 
built in the town, in 1800, and obtained the name of West 
Row, as distinguished from South Row, near the Old South, 
and Xorth Row in Anne Street. 

Peter Chardon, another of the Huguenot descendants, built 
a house on the corner of the street bearing his name. He was 
a man of polished manners, and an influential merchant of the 
old time. A school-house was erected in 1804, at the corner of 
Chardon and Hawkins Streets, the eighth in the town. In 
1800 Hawkins was commonly known by the name of Tattle 
Street. A portion of the latter street was occupied by the 
distil-houses which gave the name of Distil-House Square to 
the neighboring space. 

Mrs. ]\Lary Pelham, mother of Copley the painter, lived in a 
house between the estate of Governor Sullivan (near the entrance 
to ^laynard's stables) and Alden Court. She was the widow 
of Richard Copley, tobacconist, and continued to follow the 
business after her second marriage. The following advertise- 
ment may be found in the Boston News Letter of July 11, 
1748: — 



372 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

*' Mrs. Mary Pelham (formerly the widow of Copley, on Long 
Wharf, tobacconist) is removed to Lindel's Row, against the Quaker 
Meeting House, near the upper end of King Street, Boston, where 
she continues to sell the best Virginia Toljacco, Cut, Pigtail, and 
Sj)un, of all sorts, by Wholesale and Retail, at the cheapest rates." 

At this time the Pelhams lived over the tobacco shop. 
Pelham possessed a versatile genius. He kept a writing and 
arithmetic school in 1748, and was one of the earliest teach- 
ers of dancing to the P>ostonians, having had a school at the 
house of Philip Dumaresq, in Summer Street, as early as 
1738. 

He is still more noted as the earliest Boston engraver we have 
an account of, having, in 1727, engraved a portrait of Cotton 
Mather. He also engraved a number of Smibert's paintings, 
chiefly of the leading Boston divines of that day. Mr. Pelham 
also used the pencil with considerable skill. '"^ 

Retracing our steps to Green Street, we find a resident who 
brought the old and new Boston into juxtaposition, until his 
decease, in 1832, at the advanced age of eighty-one. We allude 
to Major Thomas MelviU, who lived in an old wooden house 
on the south side of Green Street, between Staniford and the 
building formerly the Church of the Advent. Thomas Mel- 
vill's father was a cadet of the Scottish family of the Earls of 
Melvill and Leven. He came to this country quite young, and 
at his death left Thomas, his only son, an orphan at the age of 
ten years. The latter was educated at New Jersey College, 
whence he graduated in 1769 ; he took the degree of A. M. 
at Harvard in 1773. He was a democrat, and a firm friend 
of Samuel Adams, of whom he had a small portrait by Copley, 
now at Harvard. Herman Melville, the well-known author, is 
his grandson. 

Major Melvill's long and honorable connection with the 
Boston Fire Department continued for forty years, and his 
death was finally caused by over-fatigue at a fire near his 
house. This connection commenced as fireward in 1779, in the 
good old times when those officers carried staves tipped at the 

* Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society. 



VALLEY ACRE, BOWLING GREEN, AND WEST BOSTON. 373 

end with a brass flame, and marshalled the bystanders into 
lines for passing buckets of water to the scene of conflagration. 
One of the town engines was named Melvill, in honor of the 
major. 

]\Iajor Melvill was a member of the Cadets, one of the mem- 
orable Tea-Party, and caj^tain in Craft's regiment of artillery in 
the Revolutionary War. He commanded a detachment sent to 
^antasket to watch the movements of the British fleet. In the 
expedition into Rhode Island, in 1778, he took the rank of 
major. On the organization of the Custom House, under State 
authority, he was appointed surveyor, which office he held until 
the death of James Lovell, when he was commissioned naval 
officer by Washington, remaining in office more than forty years, 
until superseded by President Jackson in 1829. 

The brick church mentioned in Green Street was consecrated 
in 1826, at which time Rev. Dr. William Jenks was installed 
as pastor. He was the first to found a Seamen's Bethel in Bos- 
ton ; and was the author of a valuable Commentary on the Bible, 
and many other useful works. The Doctor was a valued mem- 
ber of a number of learned societies, a pure and much-beloved 
member of society, and died sincerely regretted. His residence 
Avas in Crescent Place. 

Gouch Street, which we think should be spelled Gooch, is 
connected with an incident of American history fitly perj^etu- 
ated by the name. 

When Sir William Howe attacked Fort Washington, on the 
Hudson, and had summoned the garrison to surrender, Wash- 
ington, who from the opposite shore had witnessed the assault, 
wished to send a note to Colonel Magaw, acquainting him that 
if he could hold out till evening, he (Washington) would en- 
deavor to bring off the garrison during the night. The brave 
Captain Gooch offered to be the bearer of the note. " He ran 
down to the river, jumped into a small boat, pushed over the 
river, landed under the bank, ran up to the fort, and delivered 
the message ; came out, ran and jumped over the broken ground, 
dodging the Hessians, some of whom struck at him with their 
pieces, and others attempted to thrust liim with their bayonets ; 



374 



LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 




WEST CHURCH. 



escaping through them, he got to his boat and returned to Fort 
Lee." ^ 

Gouch Street is further noted for its sugar-houses, of which 
there were seven in the town in 1794, each capable of manufac- 
turing 100,000 pounds annually. 

The West Church, on Lynde, fronting Cambridge Street, was 

organized in 1736. Eev. William 
Hooper, father of a signer of the 
Declaration of Independence, was 
the first pastor, but after nine 
years' service he became attached 
to the Church of England, and 
crossed the ocean to take orders. 
He became afterwards pastor of 
Trinity. 

Jonathan Mayhe'w, one of the 
greatest hghts of the Boston pul- 
pit, whose eloquence stimulated 
and upheld the cause of liberty, succeeded Mr. Hooper. His 
usefulness was terminated by his decease in July, 1766, two 
months after the Stamp Act repeal, on which he preached a 
memorable discourse. Simeon Howard, Charles Lowell, and 
C. A. Bartol have been the successive pastors. 

The frame of the original Church was set up in September, 
1736, but it was not until the following spring that it was com- 
pleted. It shared the fate of other Boston churches in 1775, 
being used for barracks, and also suffered the loss of its steeple, 
taken down by the British to prevent signals being made to the 
Provincials at Cambridge. The old house was taken down and 
the present one built in 1806. The first Sunday school estab- 
lished in New England is said to have originated in the West 
Church, in 1812. 

The charitable and corrective institutions of the town, after 
their removal from Park, Beacon, and (Jourt Streets, were located 
at West Boston. The jail remained in Leverett Street until 
1851, when it was removed to its present location on the north- 



* Heath's Memoirs. 



VALLEY ACRE, BOWLIXG GREEN, AND WEST BOSTON. 375 

erly extensiou of Cliarles Street, situated on land reclaimed from 
tlie sea. This was not etfected until after twelve years' agitation 
had demonstrated the necessity for the change. There were 
two separate prisons within the same enclosure in Leverett 
Street, one of which was converted into a House of Correction 
in 1823, and was so used until some time after the completion 
of the House of Correction at South Boston. The Leverett 
Street jail Avas considered very secure, walls and floors being 
composed of large blocks of hewn stone clamped together with 
iron, while between the courses loose cannon-balls were laid in 
cavities hollowed out for the purpose. Such a building neces- 
sarily occupied some time in construction, and upon its comple- 
tion, in 1822, the old stone jail in Court Street was taken down, 
the materials going in part to build the gun-house in Thacher 
Street. 

In the Leverett Street jail debtors were confined, and even 
when under bail could not go out of the narrow limits of the 
ward in which it was situated, without forfeiture of their bonds, 
and subjecting their bondsmen to payment of the entire claim 
against them. The law which gave the creditor this power 
over the person of his unfortunate debtor was not repealed 
until a comparatively recent period, although mitigated in some 
of its more rigorous provisions. 

Charles Dickens animadverted severely upon our prison sys- 
tem, which he examined when in this country, and pronounced 
barbarous. The " American Notes " may have wounded our self- 
love, but they told some unpleasant though wholesome truths. 

Among the executions which have taken place in the enclosure 
of Leverett Street jail, that of Professor Webster is prominent. 
His demeanor at the gallows was dignified and self-possessed. 
Before he suffered the penalty of the law he addressed a letter 
to a relative of the family he had so terribly wronged, in which 
he eloquently implored that his punishment might fully expiate 
his crime. 

The streets Barton, Yernon, and Minot are of comparatively 
recent origin. They occupy the site of the Almshouse built in 
1800, after its demolition in Beacon Street. At the time of its 



376 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON". 

erection here it was situated on the bank of the river, from 
which a wharf, now forming the site of the old Lowell depot, 
extended. 

The New Almshouse, as it was called, was a brick building 
of three stories, with a central structure, from which wings ex- 
tended. This central building was considerably higher tlian 
the rest, and had lofty, arched windows, with a raised pediment 
relieved by ornamental work ; on either gable stood a carved 
emblematic figure. The whole edifice was two hundred and 
seventy feet in length by fifty-six in depth. It stood until 
May, 1825, when it was superseded by the House of Industry 
at South Boston, and the land sold to private individuals. A 
brick wall, with iron gates, surrounded the Almshouse enclosure. 
No building having been erected to take the place of the Work- 
house, or Bridewell, the inmates were obliged to be received 
into the Almshouse ; but a small brick building was subse- 
quently erected, adjacent to the latter, for a Bridewell. 

It has always been the flite of some who have known better 
days to become dependants upon the public charity. One nota- 
ble instance is mentioned of the daughter of a clergyman of 
the French Protestant Church having sought and obtained an 
asylum in the old Almshouse. She continued to visit and be re- 
ceived into the houses of her former friends, who, with intuitive 
delicacy, forebore to question her on the subject of her residence. 

The tract bounded by Cambridge Street, North Eussell Street, 
and the Hospital grounds was once under water. Bridge, Blos- 
som, and Vine Streets have all been built since 1800. 

At the west end of McLean Street (formerly South Allen), 
with the front towards Cambridge Street, stands the Massachu- 
setts General Hospital. It is built of Chelmsford gmnito, and 
was considered in 1821, when completed, the finest public or 
private edifice in New England. It stands on what was for- 
merly Prince's pasture, four acres of which constitute the Hos- 
pital domain. In 1846 it was enlarged by the addition of two 
wings. Charles Bulfinch was the architect of the original. In 
this hospital ether was first applied in a surgical operation of 
magnitude, by request of Dr. J. C. Warren. 



VALLEY ACHE, BOWLING GREEN, AND WEST BOSTON. 377 



Some of the sources from which the Hospital drew its being 
have been adverted to. A bequest of $ 5,000, at the close of 
the last century, was the beginning. N^othing further was 
effected until 1811, when lifty-six gentlemen were incorporated 
under the name of the Massachusetts General Hosi^ital. The 




MASSACHUSETTS GENERAL HOSPITAL. 



charter likewise granted the Province House, under condition 
that $ 100,000 should be raised from other sources within ten 
years. The Hospital Life Insurance Company was required to 
pay tribute to its namesake by its act of incorporation. 

IS'o eleemosynary institution in the country ever accumulated 
the means of carrying out its humane objects ^^dth greater 
rapidity. John McLean bequeathed $ 100,000 to the Hospital, 
and $ 50,000 more to be divided between that institution and 
Harvard. By the year 1816 the trustees were able to purchase 
the estate at Charlestown, now SomerviUe, and build two brick 
houses, which were ready for the reception of the insane in 
1818. This is the asylum now known by the name of its 
noble benefactor, jMcLean. His name was justly conferred 
upon the street without loss to its ancient possessor, as there 
was also Xorth Allen Street, now known simply as Allen. 

In Grove Street we have the new location of the Massachu- 
setts ]\Iedical College, after its removal from Mason Street. 
The building derives a horrible interest as the scene of the 
murder of Dr. Parkman, the details of which are yet fresh in 



378 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

the memories of many. The iinsuspecting victim repaired to 
the College, where he had an appointment with his murderer, 
from which he never departed alive, l^o similar event ever 
produced so great a sensation in Boston. Both the parties were 
of the first standing in society. The deadly blow might have 
been struck in a moment of passion, but the almost fiendish 
art with which the remains were concealed and consumed was 
fatal to Dr. Webster. Not the least of the touching episodes 
of the trial was the appearance of the daughters of the prisoner 
on the witness stand, giving their evidence under the full con- 
viction of their father's innocence. 

Besides the Howard Athenaeum the West End had still an- 
other theatre within its limits. In 1831 a small wooden build- 
ing was erected by Messrs. W. and T. L. Stewart on the old 
Mill Pond, fronting on Traverse Street. This was designed for 
equestrian performances, and was called the American Amphi- 
theatre. Mr. William Pelby, formerly of the Tremont, became 
the lessee, and remodelled the interior so as to adaj^t it to dra- 
matic performances, opening it on the 3d of July, under the 
name of the Warren Theatre, The enterprise proving success- 
ful, Mr. Pelby was enabled to build a new house in the summer 
of 1836, which was inaugurated on the 15th of August as the 
National Theatre. At this house Miss Jean Margaret Daveni:>ort 
made her first appearance before a Boston audience, as did also 
Julia Dean, a favorite Western actress. In April, 1852, the 
theatre was destroyed by fire, but was rebuilt and reopened in 
November of the same year by Mr. Leonard. 

There was a little theatre erected in 1841, at the corner of 
Haverhill and Traverse Streets, opened by Mr. Wyzeman Mar- 
shall under the name of the Eagle Theatre. Mr. W. H. Smith 
" officiated a short time here as manager, but the concern proving 
a serious rival to the National, Mr. Pelby obtained an interest, 
and closed the house in a manner not altogether creditable to 
him.''' 

Several of the companies of the regiment of Massachusetts vol- 
unteers, raised for service in the Mexican war, were quartered at 

* Clapp's Boston Stage. 



VALLEY ACRE, BOWLING GREEN, AND WEST BOSTON. 379 

tlie AVest End. Companies " A " and " B " had quarters in Pitts 
Street. Lieutenant-Colonel Abbott's company was located in 
the old wooden building on the east side of Leverett Street, 
Avhich was afterwards used as a police station. Captain Edward 
Webster's company was enlisted in the famous building on the 
corner of Court and Tremont Streets, and in the office of his 
father, Daniel Webster. Captain Webster afterwards became 
major of the regiment, and died in Mexico. Isaac Hull Wright 
was the colonel. 

The ]\Iexican war was unpopular in Boston. The regiment 
was neglected by the State officials, and greeted with oppro- 
brious epithets, and even pelted with mud, when it paraded in 
the streets. INIeetings were called in Faneuil Hall, at which 
the war and the soldiers were denounced by the antislavery 
leaders, Theodore Parker, Wendell Phillips, W. Lloyd Garrison, 
and others. As soon as the regiment was mustered into the 
United States service, the State refused to have anything fur- 
ther to do with it, and after its return home with half its 
original number, it was severely characterized by the executive. 

General Wintield Scott gave the regiment a flag of honor, 
paid for out of the ransom of the city of Mexico. This was 
offered to, but rejected by, the State, and is now in the posses- 
sion of the National Lancers. This flag represents California, 
witli its untold millions ; it should be reclaimed and placed in 
the State House. The men died ofl" rapidly after their return 
home, and not many are left. They were in a great measure of 
the worst description, and desertions were numerous. The uni- 
form was a cadet gray, with a short coatee and flat cap, which 
excited the ridicule of the dandy \varriors of the State militia, 
but has been worn by Blucher, the royal princes, and victorious 
hosts of Prussia. 



380 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

FROM CHURCH GREEN TO LIBERTY TREE. 

Churclx Green. — New South Church. — Dr. Kirkland. — American Headquar- 
ters. — General Heath. — Anecdote of General Gates. — Jerome Bonaparte. 

— Sir William Pepperell. — Nathaniel Bowditch. — George Bancroft. — 
Trinity Cliurch. — Seven Star Inn and Lane. — Peter Faneuil. — Governor 
Sullivan. — Small-Pox Parties. — Duke of Kent. — Sir Edmund Andros. 

— Lamb Tavern. — White Horse Tavern, — Colonel Daniel Messinger. — 
Lion Tavern. — Handel and Haydn Society. — Lion Theatre, — Curious 
Statement about Rats. 



THE name of Church Green was applied very early to the 
vacant space lying at the intersection of Bedford and Sum- 
mer Streets, from which we may infer that it was looked upon 
as a proper site for a meeting-house by the earliest settlers of 
Boston. The land was granted by the town to a number of 
petitioners in 1715, of whom Samuel Adams, father of the 
patriot, was one. 

There was not a more beautiful site for a church in Boston. 
The ground was high and level, 
the old church having an unob- 
structed outlook over the harbor. 
Samuel Checkley was the first 
pastor, ordained in 1718. Our 
engraving represents the church as 
rebuilt in 1814. The originators 
of the movement for the new 
church held their first meetings at 
the old Bull Tavern, at the corner 
of Summer and Sea Streets, of 
which we find mention in 1708. 

The church spire towered to a 
height of one hundred and ninety 








HEW SOUTH CHURCH. 



FROM CHURCH GREEN TO LIBERTY TREE. 381 

feet from the foundation. The building was of Chelmsford 
granite, and designed by Bultinch ; a portico projected from, 
the front, supported by four Doric columns. In 1868 it was 
demolished, and the temples of traffic have arisen in its stead. 

Fifty years gone by Summer Street was, beyond dispute, the 
most beautiful avenue in Boston. Magnihcent trees then skirted 
its entire length, overarching the driveway with interlacing 
branches, so that you walked or rode as within a grove in a 
light softened by the leafy screen, and over the shadows of the 
big elms lying across the pavement. The palaces of trade now 
rear their splendid fronts where stood the gardens or mansions 
of the old merchants or statesmen of Boston. 

The old wooden house — quite respectable for its day — in 
which Dr. John T. Kirkland resided was at the corner of Sum- 
mer and Lincoln Streets. He was the son of the celebrated 
Indian missionary, Samuel Kirkland, founder of Hamilton Col- 
lege, who was instrumental in attaching the Oneidas to the 
American cause during the Revolution, and acted as chaplain 
to our forces under General Sullivan in 1799. The younger 
Dr. Kirkland, who possessed abilities of a high order, became, 
in 1810, president of Harvard. Another eminent clergyman, 
Jeremy Belknap, was also a resident of Summer Street. 

Bedford Street was in former times known as Pond Lane, 
from the Town Watering-Place situated on the east side. A 
line draAvn due south from Hawley Street would pass through 
the pond. Blind Lane was a name applied to the lower part 
of the street in 1800. Summer Street was called " Y^ Mylne 
Street," from its conducting towards Windmill Point, where a 
mill was erected, it appears, as early as 1636, the higliway to 
it being ordered laid out in 1644. 

As late as 1815 there was a pasture of two acres in Summer 
Street, and the tinkling of cow-bells was by no means an un- 
usual sound there. The fine old estates of the Geyers, Coffins, 
Eussells, Barrells, Lydes, Prebles, etc. were covered with or- 
chards and gardens, and these hospitable residents could set 
before their guests cider of their own manufocture, or butter 
from their own dairies. Chauncy Place, named for the distin- 



382 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

giiished pastor of the First Church, was laid out in 1807, over 
a part of the estate of Ebenezer Preble, brother of Commodore 
Edward, a leading merchant of Boston, and at one time a 
partner of William Gray. Mr. Preble's house was on the lower 
corner of what is now Chauncy Street. The estate of the 
First Church adjoined on the west. 

We have noticed the residence in this street of Daniel Web- 
ster, which the stranger may find without trouble, and will not 
pass without rendering silent homage to the matchless abilities 
of that great man. Mr. Webster cared little for money, and 
was sometimes pressed by his creditors. On one occasion he 
was dunned by a needy tradesman for a trifling sum, and, after 
emptying his pockets in vain, he bade his visitor wait until he 
could call on a friend near at hand for the money. The loan 
was no sooner asked than obtained ; but at his own door Mr. 
Webster was met by an application from another friend for a 
deserving charity, to whom he gave the money he had bor- 
rowed, and returned empty-handed to his creditor. 

When Mr. Webster received Lafayette after the ceremonies 
at Bunker Hill, to give eclat to the occasion and accommodate 
the numerous and distinguished company, a door was made con- 
necting with the adjoining house of Mr. Israel Thorndike. 

The bullet which the Marquis received in his leg at Brandy- 
wine was the occasion of a graceful compliment by President John 
Quincy Adams. A new fi^igate was ready to launch at Washing- 
ton, in which it was intended Lafayette should take passage for 
France, and, when all was ready, the President, who had kept his 
purpose a secret from every one, himself christened her the Bran- 
dywine, to the surprise of Commodore Tingey and the naval 
constructor, who supposed she would be called the Susquehanna. 

The impression has obtained that Boston ceased to be a gar- 
risoned town after the evacuation by Sir William Howe, and 
the departure of the great body of our own troops for New 
York. This is very far from being the case. The command 
of the town was first assumed by Putnam, was transferred to 
Greene, and finally remained with General Ward, whose age 
and infirmity prevented his taking the field actively. The 



FROM CHURCH GREEN TO LIBERTY TREE. 383 

camps at Cambridge and Eoxbury continued to be the rendez- 
vous of the new levies. The town of Boston was the head- 
quarters of the Eastern District, with a regular garrison. James 
Urquhart, the British town-major, was succeeded by an American 
officer, ^lajor Swasey, with the same title. Colonel Keith was 
deputy adjutant-general under Heath. 

General Ward was relieved by General Heath in 1777, and 
retired from the army. General Heath established his head- 
quarters at the mansion-house of Hon. Thomas Russell, which 
stood some distance back from Summer Street, about where 
Otis Street now is. Here the General entertained D'Estaing, 
Pulaski, Silas Deane, Burgoyne, Phillips, and Riedesel. It was 
the fortune of General Heath to command in Boston while the 
prisoners from Saratoga and Bennington remained at Cambridge, 
and he was soon engaged in a petit guerre with Burgoyne. Soon 
after the arrival of the convention troops, Phillips proposed to 
General Heath that all orders affecting the prisoners should be 
transmitted through their own generals, but the American com- 
mander was not disposed to thus delegate his authority. 

Heath was succeeded by General Gates in October, 1778, who 
arrived with his wife and suite on the 6th of that month and 
assumed the command. Gates, like Washington and Gage, had 
served in the campaign of Braddock, where he was severely 
wounded, and brought off the field by a soldier for whom he 
ever after entertained an affectionate regard. Gates was then a 
captain in the British army, and his preserver was a private in 
the royal artillery, named Penfold. The old soldier, having 
been invalided, desired to remain in America, and applied to 
Gates for his advice. We give a part of the reply, which does 
honor to the heart and memory of Gates : — 

" Come and rest your firelock in my chimney-comer, and partake 
with me ; while I have, my savior Penfold shall not want ; and it 
is my wish, as well as Mrs. Gates's, to see you spend the evening 
of your life comfortably. Mrs. Gates desires to be aff'ectionately 
remembered to you." 

Boston can thus boast of having been commanded by the 
ablest generals on either side of the Revolutionary struggle. 



384 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

General Gates was said to have lived at one time with his father 
in the service of Charles, Duke of Bolton. It was his fortune 
to have achieved the greatest victory of the Revolution at Sara- 
toga, and sustained the most complete defeat at Camden, of any 
officer commanding in that v/ar. 

The Eussell mansion was afterwards occupied as a public 
house by Leon Chappotin. Jerome Bonaparte, after his mar- 
riage with Miss Patterson at Baltimore, made a visit to Boston, 
and lodged here for a time. It will be recollected that this 
marriage was never sanctioned by the Emperor. Otis Place, 
now Street, was laid out through the estate of Sir William 
Pepperell. 

The Sir William Pepperell of our notice was the grandson 
of the captor of Louisburg, and son of Colonel Nathaniel Spar- 
hawk. By the tenor of his grandfather's will, which made him 
the residuary legatee of the baronet's possessions, he was re- 
quired to change his name to Pepperell. This was done by an 
act of the Massachusetts Legislature. The baronetcy became 
extinct with the decease of the elder Sir William, and was re- 
created by the king for the benefit of his grandson in 1774. 
The younger Sir William was a stanch friend of the mother 
country, and was one of the King's IMandamus Councillors in 
1774. He left America with the lioyalists in 1775, and his 
large estates in Boston and in Maine were confiscated. 

At No. 8 Otis Place lived Nathaniel Bowditch, so long 
Actuary of the IMassachusetts Hospital Life Insurance Company 
in Boston. Born in poverty, after serving an apprenticeship to 
a ship-chandler until he was twenty-one, and following the sea 
for a number of years, he published in 1800, before he was 
thirty, his work on navigation. His commentary on the cele- 
brated Mecanique Celeste of Laplace established his fame as 
one of the leading scientific minds of either the Old or New 
World. His son, Nathaniel IngersoU, had improved an anti- 
quarian taste by exhaustive researches among the records of the 
town and colony, and the articles from his pen under the sig- 
nature of " Gleaner " were of the greatest interest to all students 
of our local history. His contemporary " Sigma " (L. M. Sar- 



FKOM CHURCH GREEN TO LIBERTY TREE. 385 

gent), wielded in the same cause a brilliant and caustic pen, 
investing the characters of the dead past with life and action. 

At the corner of AYinthrop and Otis Place was the residence 
of George Bancroft in 1840, at which time he was Collector of 
the port of Boston. His History of the United States, begun 
in 1834 and just completed, is the most extensive work on 
that subject now extant. Mr. Bancroft entered the cabinet of 
President Polk as Secretary of the Xavy in 1845, establishing, 
while at the head of his bureau, the Xaval Academy at Anna- 
polis. He is now our minister at Berlin. 

The estate at the southwest corner of Siunmer and Chaun- 
cy Streets was the property of the First Church, having been 
conveyed to it in 1680. The greater part of the original place 
was laid out over the church estate to gain access to the church, 
which was placed upon that part of the ground in the rear of 
Summer Street formerly the garden of the parsonage. Four 
brick dwellings were built on the Summer Street front by 
Benjamin Joy in 1808. Before this took place the ground was 
occupied by the i3arsonage. One of the j^astors who tilled the 
pulpit after the removal to this locality was William Emerson, 
father of Ealph Waldo Emerson, the essayist and poet. His 
ministrations continued from 1799 to 1811, and he had the 
distinction of preaching the first sermon here. 

After sixty years' service, the house in Chauncy Place was 
deserted by the society for the new and elegant temple at the 
corner of Marlborough and Berkeley Streets, which was occu- 
pied December, 1868. An enduring relic of the " Old Brick " 
church remains in a slab of slate taken from beneath a window 
in the second story, south side, on which is inscribed, — 

"Bunied to ashes October 8, 1711. 
Rebuilding June 25th, 1712. July 20, 1713." 

The Post-Office occupied this corner in 1859, at which time 
Nalium Capen was postmaster; but remained only until the 
next year, the site not being considered an eligible one. 

By the year 1728 King's Chapel could not accommodate its 
numerous parishioners a,t the south part of the town, and steps 
were taken to build an Episcopal church at the corner of Haw- 
17 Y 



386 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



ley and Summer Streets. The corner-stone was not laid, liow- 
ever, until 1734, when Mr. Commissary Price of King's Chapel 
officiated at this ceremony. The next year it was opened 
for worship. Among the first officers we find the familiar 
names of Charles A2)thorp, Benjamin Faneuil, Philip Dumaresq, 
William Coffin, and Thomas Aston. Eev. Addington Daven- 
port, a brother-in-law of Peter Faneuil, who had been an 
assistant at King's Chapel in 1737, was the first rector of 
Trinity. 

The first building was of wood. It was ninety feet long, and 
sixty broad, without any external adornment. It had neither 




OLD TRINITY CHURCH. 



tower nor 
lile, nor win- 
dows in the low- 
er story of the 
front. There 
were three en- 
trances in front 
unprotected by 
porches. The 
interior was 
composed of an 
arch resting up- 
on Corinthian 
pillars with 
the chancel were 
Taken 



handsomely carved and gilded capitals. In 
some paintings, considered very beautiful in their day. 
altogether, Trinity might boast the handsomest interior of 
any church in Boston of its time. In 1828 it was supplanted 
by the granite edifice seen in our view on the opposite page, 
Eev. John S. J. Gardiner laying the corner-stone. Trinity, like 
the other Episcoj^al churches, has tombs underneath it. 

"We do not learn that Trinity received any special marks of 
royal favor, such as were sliown to its predecessors, King's 
Chapel and Christ Church. To the former the king and queen 
(William and Mary) gave, besides the communion plate, a pul- 
pit-cloth, a cushion, and a painting which reached from the top 



FROM CHURCH GREEN TO LIBERTY TREE. 



387 



to the bottom of the east end of the church, containing the 
Decalogue, the Lord's Prayer, and the Apostles' Creed. But 
Governor Shirley, who had so liberally aided the Chapel, gave 
Trmity a service for communion, table-cloths, and books. Peter 
Faneuil had in 1741 ottered .£100 towards an organ, but one 
was not procured until 1744. 

When General Washington was in Boston in 1789 he passed 
the Sabbath here, and went to hear 
Dr. (afterwards Bishop) Parker in the 
forenoon, and to Brattle Street in the 
afternoon, where he sat in Governor 
Bowdoin's pew. 

Curiously enough. Trinity Church 
occupies the site of the old " Pleiades " 
or " Seven Star Inn," from which Sum- 
mer Street took its ancient name of 
Seven Star Lane. There was another 
sign of the same name displayed by trinity church in is72. 
William Whitwell, a tradesman near the drawbridge, in 1763. 

Peter Faneuil occupied pew No. 40 in Old Trinity. We 
may easily picture him descending from his chariot on a Sun- 





day morning while his negro coachman assists him to alight. 

We doubt not the heads of the young Boston belles were 

turned towards the wealthy bachelor as he advanced up the 

aisle to his devotions. His good brother Davenport no doubt 

enjoyed those perquisites so pleasantly referred to by Pope 

when he says, — 

" He that hath these may pass his life, 
Drink with tlie 'squire, and kiss his wife ; 
On Sundays preach, and eat his fill ; 
And fast on Fridays, — if he will ; 



388 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Toast Cliurcli and Queen, explain the news, 
Talk with chuivh -wardens about pews, 
Pray heartily for some new gift, 
* And shake his head at Dr. Swift." 

The corner of Hawley Street, next below Trinity, will be 
remembereil as the estate of Governor James Sullivan and 
of Lieutenant-Governor Gray. 

Governor Sullivan was tlie brother of the Eevolutionary 
general; was elected governor of Massachusetts in 1807, and 
re-elected in 1808. He had been a member of the ^lassachu- 
setts Provincial Congress ; Judge of the Superior Court ; and 
Delegate to Congress in 178-1, from the District of Maine where 
he then resided. ^Ir. Sullivan was also a member of the State 
Constitutional Convention, and one of tlie Commissionei-s ap- 
pointed by Washington to settle the boundary between the 
United States and British Provinces. AVilliam Sidlivan, son 
of the governor, was a distinguished lawyer and scholar. He 
was a stanch Federalist, and wrote an able vindication of that 
party. 

When Governor Sullivan was before the people as a candi- 
date, it is said a caricature ap})eared in tlie Centinel reflecting 
severely upon his integrity. His son, Eichard Sullivan, way- 
laid Benjamin Russell, the editor, in the vicinity of Scollay's 
Buildings, as he was proceeding to the office from his residence 
in Pinckney Street, and after demanding of Eussell if he was 
responsible fur all that appeared in his paper, and receiving an 
affirmative answer, struck him a blow across the face with his 
cane, leaving Eussell staggered by the violence and suddenness 
of the attack. 

The elder Levi Lincoln was lieutenant-governor Avith Gov- 
ernor Sullivan, and on his decease became acting governor. 
His son Levi was lieutenant-governor in 1823, and governor 
in 1825-34. Another son, Enoch, was governor of Maine in 
1827-29. On the decease of their mother, Martha Lincoln, 
her remains were followed to the grave by her two sons, then 
chief magistrates of two States. 

Joseph Barrell, whom we have mentioned in our view of 
Franklin Street, was one of the foremost of the old merchants 



FEOM CHURCH GREEN TO LIBERTY TREE. 389 

of Boston. His name stands first on the list of directors of 
the Old United States Bank, in company with John Codman, 
Caleb Davis, Christopher Gore, John Coffin Jones, John Low- 
ell, Theodore Lyman, Jonathan Mason, Jr., Joseph Russell, Jr., 
David Sears, Israel Thorndike, and William Wetmore. 

It is related that a person carried to a bank in Pennsylvania 
some bills which that bank had issued, and demanded gold and 
silver for them. He was answered that the bank did not pay 
gold or silver. " Give me, then," said he, " bills of the United 
States Bank." " We have none." " Then give me bills on 
any bank in Xew England." " We have none of these." '' Pay 
me, then, in the best counterfeit bills you have." 

The reader will perhaps experience some incredulity when he 
is told that, before the discovery of the present mode of vaccina- 
tion, small-pox parties were among the fasliionable gatherings 
of Old Boston. The guests were inoculated, and withdrew for 
a time from the world. An invitation of this kind appears in 
the following extract from a letter of Joseph Barrell, dated 
July 8, 1776: — 

" ISIr. Storer has invited Mrs. Martin to take the small-pox at his 
house : if Mrs. Wentworth desires to get rid of her fears in the same 
way, we will accommodate her in the best way we can. I 've several 
friends that I 've invited, and none of them will be more welcome 
than Mrs. W." * 

Joseph Barrell occupied store Xo. 3, south side of the Town 
Dock, where he advertised brown sugar, double and treble re- 
fined, looking-glasses, wine, oil, etc. 

He was the owner of the triangular estate at the junction of 
Washington with Brattle Street, of which he gave a portion to 
the town for the widening of the latter. 

The fine granite structure of the IMessrs. Hovey stands on 
tlie site of the old-time mansion of the Vassalls, erected by 
Leonard Yassall, whose son William built the house on Pem- 
berton Hill, afterwards the residence of Gardiner Greene. 
Thomas Hubbard, who preceded Hancock as Treasurer of Har- 
vard CoUege, and Frederick Geyer, who left Boston with tliG 

* Brewster's Portsmouth. 



390 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

adherents of the crown, were subsequent proprietors ; as the 
estate of the latter it was conhscated, but was subsequently 
restored. 

When the Duke of Kent, son of George III., and father of 
Victoria, the reigning Queen of England, was in Boston, he was 
present at the wedding of Nancy W. Geyer, who married Eufus 
G. Aniory. Prince Edward, as he was then styled, did not in- 
cline to visit Lieutenant-Governor Samuel Adams. 

South of the Yassall-Geyer property was the estate of John 
Eo we, whose house — subsequently that of Judge Prescott, father 
of the historian — stood upon the spot lately occupied by Dr. 
Eobbins's Church in Bedford Street, opposite the English High 
and Latin ScIioxdIs. A wharf and street once handed down the 
name of Rowe, — as true a friend to his country as any whose 
names have reached a greater renown, — but the wharf alone 
retains this title. Rowe Street, which was given to and accepted 
by the city on condition that it should be so called, has be- 
come since 185G absorbed in Chauncey Street, that part lying 
between Bedford and Summer Streets having been previous to 
this divided by an iron fence, the southerly portion being 
known as Bedford and the northerly as Chauncey Place. 

Bidding adieu to Summer Street, we pause for a moment at 
what Avas formerly Bethune's Corner, where now are the glit- 
tering shop-windows of Shreve, Crump, and Low, and where 
a ceaseless human tide, crossing the narrow street, struggles with 
the passing vehicles. From the old mansion-house of Thomas 
English, which stood here, was buried Benjamin Eaneuil. 

Looking in the direction of the Old South, a little north of 
Summer Street, was the reputed residence of Sir Edmund An- 
dros, who dwelt, it is said, in an old house which disappeared 
about 1790, and which stood nearly on the spot now occupied 
by W. H. Allen, 216 Washington Street. This tradition ex- 
isted early in the present century, and may have been true, 
though it could not have been the habitation of the knight 
when Lady Andros, to whose funeral we have referred in a 
former chapter, died. Andros was governor of New England 
only three years. We know that his country-seat was at 



FROM CHURCH GREEN TO LIBERTY TREE. 391 

Dorchester, — it was still standing in 1825, — and there is 
abundant evidence that he lived in Boston, but none that we 
are aware of, that he owned an estate here. Though a change 
of residence was less common among the old inhabitants of 
Boston than at the present day, it was no anomaly. 

Earl Bellomont, writing to the Lords of Trade from Boston, 
in 1G98, says he paid £ 100 a year for a house, besides his 
charge f )r a stable, and continues in the following strain : — 

" It is for the King's honour that his Governour have a house ; 
there is a very good house plot where Sir Edmund Andros lived in 
the best part of the town. 'T is the least of their thoughts I doubt 
to build a house for the King's Governour." 

This refers without doubt to Cotton Hill or the vicinity, 
which was then the best part of the town, and Andros only 
followed the example of Endicott, Bellingham, and Vane, when 
he located there. The region lying around Summer Street was 
then considered remote, and less than fifty years ago, when Ann 
Bent kept a little shop on the spot where the despotic old 
dragoon of Prince Eupert is said to have dwelt, her customers 
at the North End complained that she was too far out of 
town. 

Threading our way through old Xewbur}^ Street with our 
face towards the south, we pass the old stand of Thomas and 
Andrews. As early as the great fire of 1711, Increase Mather 
says, there were seven booksellers* shops in Boston. In 1747 
the Exchange (Old State House) was surrounded with book- 
sellers' shops, there being at the same time no less than five 
printing-offices in the town, which were generally well em- 
ployed, deriving their cliief support from the colleges and 
schools of Xew England. At this time the Boston Gazette 
was printed twice a week. Thomas printed the Spy in " Union 
Street, near the market," " at the south corner of Marshall's 
Lane, leading from the Mill Bridge into Union Street," and 
"at the bottom of Eoyal Exchange Lane near the Market, 
Dock Sfpiare," besides Back Street, where the first number was 
probably printed. 

"We cannot pass by the neighborhood of Avon Street with- 



392 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

out thinking of old Bartholomew Green and his Xews Letter, 
of Benjamin Church and liis treachery, of Margaret Fuller and 
her untimely fate, any more than we can pass the Old South 
without thinking of the riding-school, or Bunker Hill Monu- 
ment without thinking of Prescott and Warren. 

A group of taverns next claims our attention. The inns of 
Old London rendered up their names freely to their colonial 
imitators, and our older residents might drink their j^unch 
under the same signs they were used to frequent beneath the 
shadow of Old Saint Paul's. We have had no Johnson with 
his corner at the Mitre, no Dryden with his snug retreat at Will's 
Coffee-house, nor can we show any as famous as Button's, where 
Pope, Steele, Swift, Arbuthnot, and Addison were wont to 
assemble at " the best head in England " ; but we have visited 
some where matters more serious than wit and sentiment were 
discussed, and where measures were digested more important to 
mankind. 

We commend to our modern hotel-keepers the following ex- 
tract from a law enacted about 1649 : — 

"Nor shall any take tobacco in any inne, or common victual 
house, except in a private room there, so as the master of said house 
nor any guest there shall take offence thereat ; which if any do, 
then such persons shall forbear, upon pam of two shilhngs and 
sixpence for every such offence." 

We come first to the Adams House, which stands on the 
ground formerly occupied by the Lamb Tavern, sometimes styled 
the White Lamb. The " Lamb " was an unpretending building 
of two stories, but of good repute in Old Boston. The sign is 
noticed as early as 1 746. Colonel Doty kept at the sign of the 
Lamb in 1760 ; Edward Kingman kept it in 1826 ; after which 
it was conducted successively by Laban Adams, for whom the 
house was named, father of " Oliver Optic " (W. T. Adams), and 
by A. S. Allen. The first stage-coach to Providence, advertised 
July 20, 1 767, by Thomas Sabin, put up at the sign of the Lamb. 

The White Horse Tavern was a few rods south of the Lamb, 
situated nearly opposite the mansion-house of Dr. Lemuel Hay- 
ward, physician and surgeon, from whose estate Hayward Place 



FEOM CHURCH GREEN TO LIBERTY TREE. 393 

is named. It had a large square sign projecting over the foot- 
way, on which was deUneated a wliite charger. We find this 
tavern mentioned in 1794, and infer that it was the rendezvous 
of one of the companies of the Boston Regiment, as young 
AVoodbridge came here for his sword before meeting Phillips on 
tlie Common. It was kept by Joseph Morton, father of Perez 
Morton, in 1760, and for a long time thereafter. In 1787 
Israel Hatch became mine host ; we append his advertisement 
entire : — 

TAKE NOTICE! 

Entertainment for 

Gentlemen and Ladies 

At the White Horse Tavern, 

Newbury-Street. 

My friends and travellers, yoxi '11 meet 

With kindly welcome and good cheer, 

And what it is you now shall hear : 

A spacious house and liquors good, 

A man who gets his livelihood 

By favours granted ; hence he '11 be 

Always smiling, always free : 

A good large house for chaise or chair, 

A stable well expos'd to air : 

To finish all, and make you blest. 

You '11 have the breezes from the west. 

And — ye, who flee th' approaching Sol, 

My doors are open to your call ; 

Walk in — and it shall be my care 

T' oblige the weary traveller. 

From Attleborough, Sirs, I came. 

Where once I did you entertain, 

And now shall here as there before 

Attend you at my open door. 

Obey all orders with despatch, 

— Am, Sirs, your servant, 

Israel Hatch. 
Boston, May 14, 1787. 

Colonel Daniel Messinger, who was always in request to sing 
the odes on public occasions, commenced business near the 
Lamb Tavern in 1789. He was by trade a hatter, and had 
served an apprenticeship with XathaJiiel Balch (Governor Han- 

17* 



394 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

cock's favorite) at 72 Old Cornhill. Colonel Messinger had a 
voice of great strength and purity, and had sung in presence of 
Washington, Lafayette, Jerome Bonaparte, and other distin- 
guished personages. 

Another neighbor of -the Lamb was the Lion Tavern, on the 
site of the present Melodeon. Its sign was the traditional 
British Lion, but it seems to have lived on terms of amity with 
its peaceful neighbor. The tavern at length passed into the 
possession of the Handel and Haydn Society, and was devoted 
to tlie performance of oratorios. This society organized 30th 
March, 1815, and first met at Graupner's Hall, Franklin Street. 
The original number of members was thirty-one, and their first 
public performance was given in King's Chapel, Christmas 
evening, 1815, when selections from the Creation, Messiah, etc. 
were given in presence of an audience of upwards of a thousand 
persons. The Lion was, in 1789, called the Turk's Head. 

The Lion Tavern estate was called the Melodeon by the 
Handel and Haydn Society, in place of which we now have the 
splendid structure of the same name. The first Melodeon was 
occupied by Rev. Theodore Parker's society on Sundays. Both 
societies removed later to Music Hall in Winter Street. 

In 1835 the Lion Tavern became the property of ]\Ir. James 
Raymond, and was immediately transformed into an amphi- 
theatre, under the name of the Lion Theatre. It opened in 
January, 1836, with a comedy by Buckstone, supplemented by 
equestrian performances. Mr. J. B. Booth appeared at this 
theatre in May, 1836. It passed through varying fortunes 
until 1844, when, after it had been rechristened the Melodeon, 
Mr. Macready and Miss Cushman appeared here for a short 
season. Jenny Lind, Sontag, and Albohi, all gave concerts at 
the Melodeon. 

There seems to have been a time in the history of Boston 
when the settlers were called upon to wage a war of extermina- 
tion against a domestic enemy, one which they had undoubtedly 
brought among themselves. Our readers have heard of a bounty 
for the scalps of savages, wolves' ears, and bears' claws, but 
never perhaps of a price being set upon rats, as the folloAving 



FROM CHURCH GREEN TO LIBERTY TREE. 395 

extract from the town records, selected from a number of 
the same description, will show was once the case : — 

" On the first day of January, 1743, the Selectmen gave a certifi- 
cate to the Province Treasurer, that they had paid out of the Town 
Stock to sundry persons for 9^80 Rats killed in or near the Town, 
since the last day of August, <£154. 13' 4*? old tenor — and desired 
him to pay the same to Joseph Wadsworth Esqr., Town Treasiu'er." 



396 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



CHAPTEE XIV. 

LIBERTY TREE AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 

Liberty Tree. — Its History. — Hanover Square. — Liberty Hall. — Hanging 
in Effigy. — Auchniuty's Lane. — The Old Suffolk Bench and Bar. — 
Boylston Market. — Charles Matthews. — James E. Murdoch. — Peggy 
Moore's. — Washington Bank. — Beacli Street Museum. — Essex Street. — 
Rainsford's Lane. — Harrison Avenue. — Admiral Sir Isaac Coffin. — Gen- 
eral John Coffin. — Anecdote of Admiral Coffin. — Sir Thomas Aston 
Coffin. — Henry Bass. — Old Distill-houses. — Manufacture of Rum. — 
Gilbert Stuart, — Anecdotes of. — First Glass Works. — Disappearance of 
Trees. — Early Planting of Trees. — Sir Roger Hale Sheaife. — South 
Cove. — Hollis Street. — Colonel John Crane. — General Ebenezer Stevens. 
— Mather Byles, — Anecdotes of. — Hollis Street Church. — Fire of 1787. 

LAFAYETTE said, when in Boston, ''The world should 
never forget the spot where once stood Liberty Tree, so 
famous in your annals." It has been the care of David Sears 
that this injunction should not fall to the ground unheeded. 

In the wall of the building at the southeast corner of Essex 
Street, at its junction with Washington, we see a handsome 
freestone bas-relief, representing a tree with wide-spreading 
"branches. This memorial is placed directly over the spot where 
stood the famed Liberty Tree. An inscription informs us that 

it commemorates : — 

Liberty 1776 

Law and Order 

Sons of Liberty 1766 

Independence of their country 1776. 

The open space at the four corners of Washington, Essex, 
and Boylston Streets was once known as Hanover Square, from 
the royal house of Hanover, and sometiiAes as the Elm Neigh- 
borhood, from the magnificent elms with which it was environed. 
It was one of the finest of these that obtained the name of Lib- 
erty Tree, from its being used on the first occasion of resistance 
to the obnoxious Stamp Act. In 1774 this tree, with another, 



LIBERTY TREE AXD THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 



397 



stood m the enclosure of an old-fashioned dwelling at the his- 
toric corner; in 1766, when the repeal of the Stamp Act took 
place, a large copper plate was fastened to the tree inscribed in 
golden characters : — 

"This tree was planted in the year 1646, and pruned by order of the Sons of 
Liberty, Feb. 14th, 1766." 

In August, 1775, the name of Liberty having become offen- 
sive to the tories and their British allies, the tree was cut down 
by a party led by one Job Williams. " Armed with axes, they 
made a furious attack upon it. After a long speU of laughing 
and grinning, sweating, swearing, and foaming, with malice 
diabolical, they cut down a tree because it bore the name of 
Liberty." * Some idea of the size of the tree may be formed 

from the fact that it made 
fourteen cords of wood. 
The jesting at the expense 
of the Sons of Liberty 
had a sorry conclusion; 
one of the soldiers, in at- 
tempting to remove a 
limb, feU to the pavement 
and was killed. 

The ground immedi- 
ately about Liberty Tree 
was popularly known as 
Liberty Hall. In August, 
1767, a flagstaff had been 
' erected, which went 
through and extended 
above its highest branches. 
A flag foisted upon this staff was the signal for the assembling 
of the Sons of Liberty for action. Captain ^Mackintosh, the 
last captain of the Popes, was the first captain-general of 
Liberty Tree, and had charge of the illuminations, hanging of 
effigies, etc. 

* Essex Gazette, 1775. 




LIBERTY TRKE. 



398 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

After the old war was over a liberty-pole was erected on the 
stump of the tree, the latter long serving as a point of direction 
known as Liberty Stump. A second pole was placed in posi- 
tion on the 2d July, 1826. It was intended to have been raised 
during the visit of Lafayette in 1825, and the following lines 
were written by Judge Dawes : — 

" Of high renown, here grew the Tree, 
The Elm so dear to Liberty ; 
Your sires, beneath its sacred shade, 
To Freedom early homage paid. 
Tliis day with filial awe suiTomid 
Its root, that sanctifies the ground. 
And by your fathers' spirits swear. 
The rights they left you '11 not impair. " 

Governor Bernard, writing to Lord Hillsborough undar date 
of June 18, 1768, gives the following account of Liberty 
Tree : — 

" Your Lordship must know that Liberty tree is a large old Elm 
in the High Street, upon which the effigies were hung in the time 
of the Stamp Act, and from whence the mobs at that time made 
their parades. It has since been adorned with an inscription, and 
has obtained the name of Liberty Tree, as the ground under it has 
that of Liberty Hall. In August last, just before the commencement 
of the present troubles, they erected a flagstaff, which went through 
the tree, and a good deal above the top of the tree. Upon this they 
hoist a flag as a signal for the Sons of Liberty, as they are called. I 
gave my Lord Shelburne an account of this erection at the time it 
was made. This tree has often put me in mind of Jack Cade's Oak 
of Eeformation." 

Liberty Tree Tavern in 1833 occupied the spot where once 
Liberty Tree stood. It was kept by GrCummings. In its im- 
mediate vicinity and opposite the Boylston Market was Lafay- 
ette Hotel, built in 1824, and kept by S. Haskell in the year 
above mentioned. • 

The Sons of Liberty adopted the name given them by Colonel 
Barr6 in a speech in Parliament, in which he took occasion thus 
to characterize those who evinced a disposition to resist the 
oppressive measures of the Ministry. Under the branches of 
Liberty Tree that resistance first showed itself by public acts. 



LIBERTY TREE AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 399 

At daybreak on the 14:th August, 1765, nearly ten years 
before active hostilities broke out, an effigy of Mr. Oliver, the 
Stamp officer, and a boot, with the Devil peeping out of it, — 
an allusion to Lord Bute, — were discovered hanging from 
Liberty Tree. The images remained hanging all day, and were 
visited by great numbers of people, both from the town and 
the neighboring country. Business was almost suspended. 
Lieutenant-Governor Hutchinson ordered the sheriff to take 
the figures down, but he was obliged to admit that he dared 
not do so. 

As the day closed in the effigies were taken down, placed 
upon a bier, and, followed by several thousand people of every 
class and condition, proceeded first to the Town House, and 
from thence to the supposed office of the Stamp jMaster, as has 
been detailed in that connection. With materials obtained 
from the ruins of the building, the procession moved to Fort 
Hill, where a bonfire was lighted and the effigies consumed in 
full view of Mr. Oliver's house. Governor Bernard and council 
were in session in the Town House when the procession passed 
through it, as the lower floor of the building left open for public 
promenade permitted them to do. In the attacks which fol- 
lowed upon the houses of the secretary, lieutenant-governor, 
and officers of the admiralty, IMackintosh appears to have been 
the leader. In these proceedings the records of the court of 
vice-admiralty were destroyed, — an irreparable loss to the prov- 
ince and to history. Mackintosh was arrested, but immediately 
released on the demand of a number of persons of character 
and property. 

Mr. Oliver now publicly declared his intention of resigning, 
and when the stamps arrived in Boston in September they were 
sent to Castle William. In November there Avas another hanfi- 
ing in effigy of two of the king's advisers. The anniversary of 
Pope Day was celebrated by a union of the rival factions, who 
met in amity and refreshed themselves under Liberty Tree 
before proceeding to Copp's Hill, as was customary. But the 
greatest act which occurred under this flimous tree was the 
public declaration of Secretary Oliver that he would not in any 



400 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

way, by himself or by deputy, perform the duties of stamp 
master. The Secretary, desirous of less publicity, had requested 
that the ceremony might take place at the Town House, but 
the " Sons " had determined that the " Tree " was the proper 
place, and Mr. Oliver presented himself there. Besides this 
declaration, subscribed to before Eichard Dana, justice of the 
peace, Mr. Oliver fully recanted his sentiments in favor of the 
Stamp Act, and desired the people no longer to look upon 
him as an enemy, but as a friend, — a piece of duplicity 
fully exposed by the discovery of his correspondence on the 
subject. 

On the 14th February, 1766, the tree was pruned under the 
direction of skillful persons, and on the 20th the plate was 
attached. On this day the ceremony of burning stamped papers, 
and the effigies of Bute and Grenville, took place at the gallows 
on the Neck, the Sons returning to Hanover Square, where they 
drank his Majesty's health and other toasts expressive of their 
loyalty to the throne. 

From this time all measures of public concern were discussed 
by the Sons of Liberty under the umbrageous shelter of their 
adored tree. The affair of Hancock's sloop, the arrival of the 
troops, the Non-importation Act, each received the attention 
they merited. On the 14th August, 1769, anniversary of the 
first Stamp Act proceedings, and '' the day of the Union and 
firmly combined Association of the Sons of Liberty in this 
Province," there was a great assembly under Liberty Tree. 
Many came from great distances. Eeed and Dickinson (a 
brother of John Dickinson) were present from Philadelphia. 
Peyton Randolph was expected, but did not come. The British 
flag was hoisted over the tree, and, after drinking fourteen 
toasts, the meeting adjourned to Robinson's Tavern, Dorchester, 
known also as the sign of the Liberty Tree, where the day was 
passed in festivity and mirth. John Adams was present, and 
has left an account of the gathering, into which we should not 
have to look in vain for Samuel Adams, "Otis, and their com- 
patriots. 

After the establishment of the troops in Boston the necessity 



LIBERTY TREE AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 401 

for secrecy in tlieir movements compelled the patriots to resort 
to the clubs for conference. The tree, however, had borne its 
part in the acts preliminary to the great conflict which ensued, 
and to pilgrims to the shrines of American history the spot 
where it once stood must ever possess an interest second to no 
other in this historic city. 

*' The tree their own hands had to liberty reared 
They lived to beliold growing strong and revered ; 
With transport then cried, ' Now our wishes we gain, 
For our children shall gather the fruits of our pain. ' 
In freedom we 're born, and in freedom we 11 live ; 
Our purses are ready, — 
Steady, friends, steady ; — 
Not as slaves, but as freemen, our money we '11 give." 

• Samuel Adams, a namesake of the Eevolutionary patriot and 
an old resident of North End, had in his possession until his 
death, in 1855, a flag which was used on the liberty-pole 
prior to the Revolution, and which he displayed on jDublic 
occasions with great satisfaction. Some services which he per- 
formed on the patriots' side, in which he sustained losses, pro- 
cured him a small appropriation from the State. 

The hanging of efligies appears to have originated in England 
in 1763. This was at Honiton, in Devonshire, famous for its 
lace manufacture, two years before the exliibitions in Boston 
from the limbs of Liberty Tree. A tax having been levied 
upon cider, the efiigy of the minister concerned in it was sus- 
pended from an apple-tree that grew over the road, with the 
following lines affixed to it : — 

" Behold the man who made the yoke 
Which doth Old England's sons provoke, 
And now he hangs upon a tree. 
An emblem of our liberty." 

Essex Street was the line of division between old I^ewbury 
and Orange Streets. Newbury reached to Winter Street, while 
Orange conducted from the fortifications on the Xeck into town ; 
its name was no doubt given in honor of the Prince of Orange. 
Essex Street, which was named in 1708, was also called Auch- 
muty's Lane, for the family so distinguished in the history of 
the old Suff-olk Bar. 



402 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

The elder Eobert Aucliinuty was a barrister during the ad- 
ministration of Belcher and Shirley, and in his latter years judge- 
advocate of the Court of Admiralty. 

The younger Auchmuty was judge of the same court when 
the Eevolution began. His associates at the bar were Eead, 
Pratt, Gridley, Trowbridge, Adams, Otis, the gifted Thacher, 
and the brilliant Quincy. He was born in Boston, and assisted 
Adams and Quincy in the defence of Captain Preston, for his 
participation in the massacre in King Street. His residence was 
in School Street, next the old Extinguisher Engine-house. 
A nephew, Sir Samuel Auchmuty, born in New York, fought 
against his countrymen in the service of King George. 

Benjamin Pratt, afterwards chief justice of New York, mar- 
ried a daughter of the old Judge Auchmuty. He was a small, 
thin man, and from the loss of a limb was obliged to use 
crutches. It was of him that John Adams said " that he had 
looked with wonder to see such a little body hung upon two 
sticks send forth such eloquence and displays of mind." Pratt's 
office was in the second house north of the corner of Court Street 
in Old Cornhill, where Gould and Lincoln's bookstore now is ; 
his country-seat was on Milton Hill. 

Oxenbridge Thacher's office was opposite the south door of 
the Old State House. Sampson Salter Blowers, eminent at the 
same bar, lived in Southack's Court (Howard Street). Gridley, 
with whom James Otis studied, lived in a house next north of 
Cornhill Square. John Adams's office was in a house next 
above William Minot's, which was on Court Street, opposite 
the Court House, where now stands Minot's Building. Eead 
built and lived in the house described as Mr. Minot's. Cazneau 
lived in a house next east of the Court House. Chief Justice 
Dana's father lived at the corner of Wilson's Lane. John 
Quincy Adams's office was in Court Street. 

Before the Eevolution eight dollars was the fee in an impor- 
tant cause, five dollars was the limit for a jury argument, two 
dollars for a continuance. Then the lawyers went the circuits 
with the judges. The courtesy and dignity which distinguished 
the intercourse between bench and bar did not continue under 



LIBERTY TREE AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 403 

the new order of things, if we may credit Fisher Ames, who, 
in aUusion to the austerity of the court, supposed to be Judge 
Paine, and the manners of the attorneys, remarked, that a 
lawyer should go into court with a club in one hand and a 
speaking-trumpet in the other. Chief Justice Parsons and 
Judge Sedgwick were the last barristers who sat upon the 
bench. Perez Morton and Judge Wetmore were the last sur- 
vivors who had attained the degree. 

Boylston Market, when opened to the public in 1810, was 
considered far out of town. It was named to honor the benev- 
olent and philanthropic Ward Mcholas Boylston, a descend- 
ant of that Dr. Zabdiel Boylston so famous in the history of 
inoculation. The parties interested in the movement met at 
the Exchange Coffee House on the 17th of January, 1809, 
when their arrangements were perfected. John Quincy Adams, 
who then lived in Boylston Street, was much interested in the 
new market, and made a brief address at the laying of the 
corner-stone. The building was designed by Bulfinch, and Mr. 
Boylston presented the clock. In 1870 the solid brick struc- 
ture Avas moved back from the street eleven feet without disturb- 
ing the occupants. Before the erection of this market-house, 
Faneuil Hall Market was the principal source of supply for the 
inhabitants of this remote quarter. 

Boylston Hall, over the market — which has also been known 
as Pantheon Hall and Adams Hall — is associated with a 
variety of musical, theatrical, and miscellaneous entertainments. 
It was occupied by the Handel and Haydn Society in 1817, the 
year after their incorporation, and used by them for their mu- 
sical exhibitions. In 1818 Incledon and Phillips,* the cele- 
brated vocalists, assisted at their performances. The celebrated 
Charles Matthews gave his "Trip to Paris " here in 1822, after 
the close of his engagement at the old theatre, as Mr. Clapp 
says, "to meet the wants of those holy puritans who would 
not visit the theatre to see an entertainment which they patro- 
nized in a hall." ^Ir. Buckingham, editor of the Galaxy, char- 
acterized the performance as low and vulgar, for whic^h and 
other strong expressions Matthews commenced an action for 



404 LANDMAEKS OF BOSTON. 

damages ; the suit never came to trial. A theatre was also 
established here by Wyzeman Marshall, and the since much- 
admired and successful actor Murdoch conducted at one time 
a gymnasium and school of elocution in Boylston Hall. Added 
to these, it was used by several religious societies prior to its 
present occupation as an armory. 

Upon this spot once stood the tavern of " Peggy " Moore. 
The vicinity was the usual halting-place for the country people 
coming into town with their garden produce. Then ox-teams 
were the rule, few farmers having horses, and the neighbor- 
hood of Peggy Moore's was usually a scene of plenty and of 
jollity. From the shrewdness with which barter was carried 
on, the place was dubbed " shaving corner," and among the 
keen blades who trafficked on this exchange, none, it was said, 
excelled William Foster of the neighboring lane. Even the 
future President may have cheapened his joint here, or turned 
the scale in his favor by a call at Peggy Moore's. 

The Washington Bank was long located at the corner of 
Washington and Beach Streets, where its imposing granite 
front remained until the recent erection of the present build- 
ings. The bank was incorporated in 1825, with a capital of 
half a million. For a long time previous to its demolition the 
building was occupied as a furniture warehouse. In Beach 
Street was established the short-lived Dramatic Museum in 
1848, in the budding now known as the Beach Street Market. 

We will enter upon Essex Street. A short walk brings us 
to Harrison Avenue, one of the new streets risen from the 
sea-shore. The beginning of this now handsome street, shaded 
for a considerable distance by trees, was in the portion from 
Essex Street to Beach, where it was arrested by the water. 
This was called Eainsford's Lane, until included in Front 
Street (Harrison Avenue) in 1825. The name was from 
Deacon Edward Rainsford, who took the oath of freeman in 
1637, and was one of those disarmed in the Anne Hutchinson 
controversy. His tract was on the westerly side of Essex 
Street extending to the sea, and separated from Garrett Bourne 
on the west by his lane. 



LIBERTY TREE AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 405 

Harrison Avenue, which was built in 1806-07, and first 
named Front Street, extended from Beach Street to South Bos- 
ton bridge. Up to 1830 the docks and flats on the west side of 
this street -^vere not all tilled up. Its present name was given, in 
18-41, in honor of General Harrison. A straight avenue, three 
fourths of a mile in length and seventy feet wide, was something 
unknown in Boston before this street was laid out. 

On the east side of Rainsford's Lane was the house in which 
were born Admiral Sir Isaac Coffin and his brother John, a 
major-general in the British army. Both were sons of Nathan- 
iel Coffin, Collector of his Majesty's Customs, and a firm 
loyalist. Sir Isaac was educated in the Boston schools, and 
entered the royal navy in 1773, just before the Revolution. 

John Coffin volunteered to accompany the royal army in 
the battle of Bunker Hill, and soon after obtained a commis- 
sion. He rose to the rank of captain, and went with the New 
York Volunteers to Georgia, in 1778. At the battle of Savan- 
nah, at Hobkirk's Hill, and at Cross Creek near Charleston, 
his conduct won the admiration of his superiors. At the battle 
of Eutaw his gallantry attracted the notice of General Greene. 
He was made colonel, 1797; major-general, 1803; general 
1819. 

The old mansion of the Coffins was afterwards removed 
farther up Harrison Avenue. It was of wood, three stories high, 
with gambrel roof, and may still be seen by the curious on the 
east side of the street, standing at a little distance back with 
the end towards it. 

The following anecdote of Sir Isaac is authentic. "While 
in Boston once, the admiral stopped at the Tremont House, 
and, being very gouty, was confined to his room. At King's 
Chapel prayers were offered for his recovery, and after service 
was over a gentleman paid his respects to th6 distinguished 
visitor at his room, where he found him with his leg swathed 
in bandages, and in no conciliatory mood. His footman 
having accidentally run against his gouty foot, the admiral dis- 
charged a volley of oaths at his devoted head, following them 
with his crutch. The efficacy of the prayers may be doubted. 



406 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Still another of tliis famous royalist family was destined to 
acquire rank and distinction in the British service. Sir Thomas 
Aston Coffin, Bart., was a son of Wilham Coffin of Boston, and 
cousin of Admiral Sir Isaac. All three of the distinguished 
Coffins were born in Boston, and bred in her public schools. 
Thomas was at one period private secretary to Sir Guy Carle- 
ton, and attained the rank of commissary-general in the Brit- 
ish army. He was a graduate of Harvard. 

The admiral ever retained an affectionate regard for his na- 
tive country. His family were descended from that tight 
little isle of Nantucket, where the name of the Coffins has 
been made famous in story for their exploits in the whale 
fishery. He gave evidence of his attachment by investing a 
large sum in the English funds for the benefit of the Coffin 
school on the island, of which fund the mayor and aldermen 
of Boston were made trustees for the distribution of the annual 
interest among five of the most deserving boys and as many 
girls of that school. 

Kext south of the little alley that divides Rainsford's Lane 
lived Henry Bass, one of the Tea Party, at whose house Sam- 
uel Adams and Major Melvill often passed a convivial evening 
and ate a Sunday dinner. 

Prior to 1793 tlie neighborhood of Essex and South Streets 
was largely occupied by distilleries. The oldest one is that now 
and for some time in possession of the French family, which 
appears to have been improved for that purpose as early as 
1714 by Henry Hill, distiller, and by Thomas Hill after him. 
Besides this, there were Avery's and Haskins's distilleries, be- 
tween Essex and Beach Streets ; their vicinity marks the prox- 
imity of the shore. 

We have spoken elsewhere of the manufacture of rum in 
Boston. In 1794, when the town contained a little more than 
18,000 inhabitants, there were no less than thirty distiU-houses. 
Twenty-seven were in operation in 1792, but the disturbances 
in the French West India Islands and the excise laid by Con- 
gress had diminished the number working to eighteen in the 
year first mentioned. Rum was only fourpence, and that from 
the West Indies but sixpence, a quart. 



LIBERTY TREE AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 407 

Gilbert Stuart lived and painted in 1828 in a modern three- 
story brick house, standing alone in Essex Street, numbered 59, 
near the opening of Edinboro. The latter is a modern thor- 
oughfare. Before removing to Essex Street, Stuart resided in 
Washington Place, Fort Hill, where he had a painting-room. 
He took up his permanent residence in Boston in 1806, and died 
here July 9, 1828. His two daughters, Mrs. Stebbins and Miss 
Jane Stuart, pursued their father's profession in Boston ; the 
latter still follows her art at Newport, R. I. Stuart, it is said, 
did not instruct his daughters as he might have done. 

Stuart was not particularly prepossessing in appearance, and 
was very careless in dress, but a man of great genius. His eye 
was very piercing, and photographed a subject or a sitter at a 
glance. He was easily offended, and would then destroy his 
works of great value. 

Having exhausted the patronage of Newport, Stuart went 
over to London, where he began to paint in 1781. He soon 
found himself without money and without friends in the great 
capital, and for some time played the organ at a church to 
secure the means of living. In this the knowledge of music 
cultivated in America stood him in good stead. He was a 
capital performer on the flute, and it is related by Trumbull 
that he passed his last night at Newport serenading the girls. 
His passion for music led him to neglect his art at this time, 
and some of his friends thought it necessary to advise him to 
go to work. To his musical genius he owed his bread in the 
swarming mlderness of London. 

Among the first patrons of Stuart were Lord St. Vincent, the 
Duke of Northumberland (Percy), and Colonel Barre, who, 
learning of his embarrassments, came into his room one morn- 
ing soon after he had set up an independent easel, locked the 
door, and made friendly offers of assistance. This the painter 
declined. They then said they would sit for their portraits, 
and insisted on paying half price in advance. This is Stuart's 
own relation. 

Stuart became a pupil of AVest at twenty-four, the latter 
having lent him a small sum and invited him to his studio. 



408 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

He afterwards painted a full length of Ms old master. "While 
with West, Stuart often indulged of a morning in a bout with 
the foils with his master's son Kafe (Raphael West). He was 
surprised one morning by the old gentleman just as he had 
driven Rafe to the wall, with his back to one of his father's 
best pictures. " There, you dog," says Stuart, " there I have 
you, and nothing but your background relieves you." Stuart 
painted in London at John Palmer's, York Buildings. 

Stuart, while in Paris, painted Louis XVI. But his greatest 
work was the head of Washington, now in the Athenaeum Gal- 
lery. This portrait he ottered to the State of Massachusetts for 
one thousand dollars, but it was refused. It would now be a 
matter of difficulty to fix a price upon it. The head remained 
in Stuart's room until his widow found a purchaser for it. The 
first picture of Washington painted by Stuart was a failure, 
and he destroyed it, but he produced at the second trial a 
canvas that never can be surpassed. Of the works of the older 
painters there are said to be eleven of Smibert's and eighteen 
of Blackburn's now in Boston. 

The first glass-works in Boston were located in what is now 
Edinboro Street ; the company was established in 1787. The 
Legislature granted an exclusive right to the company to manu- 
facture for fifteen years, and exemption from all taxes for five 
years ; the workmen were relieved from military duty. The 
company first erected a brick building, conical in form, but this 
proving too small, it was taken down and replaced by a wooden 
one a hundred feet long by sixty in breadth. After many em- 
barrassments the company began the manufacture of window- 
glass in November, 1793. Samuel Gore was one of the 
originators of the enterprise, but the company failed to make 
the manufacture remunerative. In 1797 the works were con- 
trolled by Charles F. Kupfer, who continued to make window- 
glass. They were blown down in the great gale of 1815, and 
subsequently taking fire, were consumed. 

The manufacture of glass in Massachusetts was begun some 
time before the Revolution in a part of Braintree called Ger- 
mantown. Nothing but bottles, however, were produced here, 



LIBERTY TREE AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 409 

and the works failed before the commencement of the war. 
The house was hurnt down and never rebuilt. 

Opposite Oliver Place are two magnificent specimens of the 
American elm, standing in the pavement before two old-time 
brick houses. They are as large as those of the Tremont Street 
mall, and are thrifty and majestic. 

Time was when the trees were everywhere ; now they are 
indeed rare, and the places that once knew them "now know 
them no more." Formerly there were few, if any, situations in 
the town in which trees were not seen, but they are now fast 
following the old Bostonians who planted them or dwelt beneath 
their grateful shade. Fifty were removed at one time from 
Charles Street when the roadway was widened ; these were 
replanted on the Common. There were two noble elms at the 
corner of Congress and Water Streets forty years ago, scarcely 
exceeded in size by those of the malls. Bowdoin Square, the 
Coolidge, Bulfinch, and Parkman estates, were adorned with 
shade and fruit trees. Occasionally, during our pilgrimage, we 
have discovered some solitary tree in an unexpected place, but 
it only stands because its time has not yet come. 

" But rising from the dust of busy streets, 

These forest children gladden many hearts ; 
As some old friend their welcome presence greets 

The toil-worn soul, and fresher life imparts. 
Their shade is doubly grateful where it lies 

Above the glare which stifling walls throw back ; 
Tlirough quivering leaves we see the soft blue skies, 

Then happier tread the dull, imvaried track." 

We have remarked that the old peninsula was but thinly 
wooded, and the settlers soon began to plant trees, supplying 
themselves with wood from the islands for a time. We find by 
the records that the town took order as early as 1655 "to pre- 
vent the trees planted on the ISTeck from being spoiled." In 
March, 1695, it appears that several attempts had been made 
by Captain Samuel Sewall " to plant trees at the south end of 
the town for the shading of Wheeler's Point," and all others 
were prohibited from meddling with them. The trees on the 
Common and Liberty Tree were planted early. There was an 
18 



410 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

English elm on the Storer estate, Sudbiiry Street, which had 
few horizontal limbs, but which attained a very great height, 
the trunk being larger than those of Paddock's Mall. We have 
pointed to its fellow on West Street. Three English elms, 
thought to have been planted by some of the Oliver family 
early in the last century, stood on the edge of High Street, in 
what was Quincy Place, on the building of which they were 
levelled. They were of the size of those in Paddock's Mall. 
A fourth of the same species stood in solitary grandeur at the 
upper part of the lot on Fort Hill, for years denominated as 
Phillips's Pasture, which was the finest specimen of the English 
elm in the town. Having " amjDle room and verge enough," it 
extended its branches horizontally in every direction. Tliis 
must have corresponded nearly in age with those mentioned in 
High Street. 

In Essex Street was the cooper-shop of Samuel Peck, one 
of the Tea Party, whose two apprentices, Henry Purkett and 
Edward Dolbier, followed him to the scene of action at Griffin's 
Wharf. 

The visitor to this quarter will find, at the corner of Essex 
and Columbia Streets, an old wooden house, to which is ascribed 
the honor of being the residence for a time of the ubiquitous 
Earl Percy. It stands at a little distance back from Essex 
Street, on which it fronts. Built of wood, with gambrel 
roof, it did not differ materially from the neighboring struc- 
tures. 

According to Mr. Sabine, this was the residence of ^Irs. 
Sheaffe, whose son, Eoger Hale, became the protege of Percy, 
who took a great liking to him while lodging with his mother 
in this house. Under the protection of the Earl the young 
Bostonian advanced to the rank of lieutenant-general in the 
British army, and became a baronet. His principal military 
service seems to have been in Canada, though it was his wish 
not to have been employed against his native country. He 
took command at Queenstown after the fall of General Brock, 
and defended Little York (Toronto) from the attack of our 
forces under General Dearborn. He was also in the attack on 



LIBERTY TREE AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 411 

Copenhagen under Nelson in 1801, and saw service in Holland. 
Sir Eoger made several visits to his native town, and is repre- 
sented as a man of generous impulses, high-minded, and well 
worthy the interest of his noble friend and patron. The build- 
ing is of course much altered in its exterior aspect. 

The lower part of Essex Street brings us to the limit of the 
South Cove improvement in tliis du-ection, by which the an- 
cient sea-border was obliterated, and a territory nearly twice as 
large as the Common added to the area of Boston. Charles 
Ewer has been named as the projector of this enterprise, which 
reclaimed from tide-water that part of the South Cove from 
Essex Street to South Boston Bridge, and lying east of Harrison 
Avenue. Work was begun in 1833, a bonus of $ 75,000 being 
paid to the Boston and Worcester Eailroad Company to locate 
its depot within the cove forever. The railway purchased 
138,000 feet of land for its purposes, and 48,000 were sold for 
the City, now the United States, Hotel. Another parcel of land 
was sold to the Seekonk Branch Eailroad Company. By 1857 
the agent had acquired seventy-tliree acres' of land and flats ; 
seventy-seven acres in all were proposed to be reclaimed. 

The locomotives, cars, rails, etc. first used on the Worcester 
railroad were all of English make. The passenger carriages 
were shaped like an old-fashioned stage-coach, contained a dozen 
persons, and ran on single trucks. They bore little comparison, 
either in size, comfort, or adornment, to the luxurious vehicles 
now used on the same road. The freight cars, or vans, had 
frames, over which was drawn a canvas covering similar to those 
in use on the army baggage-wagon, so that when seen at a little 
distance a freight train did not look unlike a number of hay- 
stacks in motion across the fields. The first locomotive used 
on this road was brought over from England on the deck of a 
ship, and was with great difficulty landed and moved across the 
city from Long Wharf. It was called the Meteor. 

We will now transfer our readers to the vicinity of Hollis 
Street. Opposite the entrance to that avenue on Tremont 
Street is a collection of old wooden buildings, whose antiquity 
is vouched for by their extreme dilapidation. Patches of the 



412 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

roof seem returning to their native earth, and the crazy struc- 
tures appear to have outHved their day and generation. 

Here was the dwelUng and carpenter-shop of Colonel John 
Crane, who came so near meeting his death in the hold of the 
tea-ship. The shop is still used by mechanics of the same 
craft. Crane, after the construction of the fortifications on the 
]S^eck, commanded that post, being then major of a regiment of 
artillery, of which the Boston company formed the nucleus. 
He became an expert marksman, and was considered the most 
skilful in the regiment. It is related that one day, as he 
sighted a gun bearing upon Boston, he intended to hit the 
house of Dr. Byles, a tory neighbor of his, who lived next 
door. The shot, however, passed over the doctor's house, and 
tore away his own ridgepole. 

Crane was wounded in IS^ew York in 1776 ; he was in Sulli- 
van's expedition to Ehode Island in 1778, and succeeded Knox 
in the command of the Massachusetts artillery. His services 
were higlily valued by the commander-in-chief, who retained 
him near his headquarters. Colonel Crane was a Bostonian by 
birth. 

Mather Byles lived in an old two-story Avooden house, with 
gambrel roof, situated just at the commencement of the bend 
or turn of Tremont Street ; so that when that street was ex- 
tended, it cut off a part of the southeast side of the house. 
What is now called Common Street is a part of old Nassau 
Street, which commenced at Boylston and ended at Orange, 
now Washington Street. Tremont Street was opened through 
to Roxbury line in 1832. At one time that part from Boylston 
to Common was called Holyoke Street. 

Rev. Mather Byles, the first pastor of Hollis Street Church, 
came on his mother's side from the stock of those old Puritan 
divines, John Cotton and Richard Mather. He was by birth a 
Bostonian, having first seen the light in 1706, and died, an 
octogenarian, in his native town in 1788. He was evidently 
l")opular with his parish, as he continued his ministrations for 
more than forty years, until his tory proclivities caused a sepa- 
ration from his flock. After the name of tory came to have a 



LIBERTY TREE AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 413 

peculiar significance, Mather Byles's associations seem to Lave 
been almost altogether with that side. He was a warm friend 
of Hutchinson and other of the crown officers, but remained in 
Boston after the adherents of the royal cause had generally left 
the town. 

" In 1777 he was denounced in town-meeting, and, having been by 
a subsequent trial pronounced guilty of attachment to the Royal 
cause, was sentenced to continenient, and to be sent with his family 
to England. This doom of banishment was never enforced, and he 
was permitted to remain in Boston. He died in 1788, aged eighty- 
two years. He was a scholar, and Pope, Lansdowne, and Watts were 
his correspondents." * 

Many anecdotes are recorded of this witty divine. On one 
occasion, when a sentinel was placed before his door, he per- 
suaded him to go an errand for him, and gravely mounted 
guard over his own house, with a musket on his shoulder, to 
the amusement of the passers-by. Dr. Byles j^aid his addresses 
unsuccessfully to a lady who afterwards married a Mr. Quincy. 
" So, madam," said the Doctor on meeting her, " you prefer a 
Quincy to Byles, it seems." The reply was, " Yes ; for if there 
had been anything worse than biles, God would have afflicted 
Job with them." His two daughters, whose peculiarities were 
scarcely less marked than those of their father, continued to 
reside in the old homestead. They remained violent tories 
until their death, though they were very poor and somewhat 
dependent upon the benevolence of Trinity Church parish. 

The following anecdotes of Rev. Mather Byles illustrate his 
pecidiar propensity. Just before the Revolution, Isaiah Thomas, 
author of the History of Printing, paid a visit to the Rev. Dr. B., 
and was taken by him to an upper window, or observatory as the 
Doctor called it, from which there was a fine prospect. " ]S"ow," 
said Dr. Byles to his companion, " you can ohserve-a-tory" At 
another time, when Dr. Byles was bowed with the infirmities 
of years. Dr. Harris, of Dorchester, called upon him, and found 
him sitting in an arm-chair. " Doctor," said the aged punster, 
" you will excuse my rising ; I am not one of the rising gener- 

* Sabine's Loyalists. 



414 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

ation," In his last illness lie was visited by Rev. "William 
Montague, rector of Christ Church, and Eev. Dr. Parker, 
rector of Trinity. Dr. Parker approached the sick man's bed- 
side, and asked him how he felt. '' I feel," said the inveterate 
joker, " that I am going where there are no bishops." 

The two following verses, addressed to Dr. Byles, are from a 
poetical description of the Boston clergy, which appeared about 
1774. It contained thirty-seven stanzas, and was the rage of 
the town. Green, Trumbull, Dr. Church, and Dexter of Ded- 
ham were all cliarged with the authorship. 

■ ** There 's punning Byles, provokes our smiles, 
A man of stately parts ; 
Who visits folks to crack his jokes, 
That never mend their hearts. 

" With strutting gait and wig so great, 
He walks along the streets, 
And throws out wit, or what 's like it, 
To every one he meets. " 

The original name of Hollis Street was Harvard. Street 
and church were named for Thomas Hollis, an eminent Lon- 
don merchant, and benefactor of Harvard College. Hollis 
Street appears on a map of 1775, continued in a straight line 
to Cambridge (Back) Bay. The growth of this part of Boston 
had, by 1730, called for a place of worship nearer than Sum- 
mer Street. Governor Belcher, who was then a resident in 
the vicinity, gave the land for a site, and a small wooden 
meeting-house, thirty by forty feet, was erected in 1732. The 
first minister was Rev. Mather Byles. A bell weighing 800 
pounds was given by a nephew of the Thomas Hollis for whom 
the church was named, and was placed in the steeple on its 
arrival. This bell began the joyful peal at one o'clock on the 
morning of the 19th of May, 1766, as nearest to Liberty Tree, 
and was answered by Christ Church from the other extremity 
of the town, announcing the Stamp Act Repeal. The steeples 
were hung with flags, and Liberty Tree decorated with banners. 

The church was destroyed by the great fire of 1787, but the 
society, nothing daunted, reared another wooden edifice in the 



LIBERTY TREE AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 



415 



year following, of wliicli we present an engraving. It was 
erected upon the same spot as the former church, but had. un- 
like it, two towers instead of a steeple. Charles Bulfinch was 
the architect, and Josiah AVheeler the builder. This building 
was removed in 1810, to give 
place to the present edifice, 
and was floated on a raft down 
tlie harbor to East Braintree, 
where Eev. Jonas Perkins 
preached in it forty-seven 
years. Though recently re- 
arranged, it remains substan- 
tially the same as wlien it 
was one of the chief orna- 
ments of the town of Boston. 




HOLLIS STREET CHURCH. 



The steeple of Hollis Street reaches an altitude of nearly 
two hundred feet, and is one of the most prominent objects 
seen from the harbor. This is the church of West, Holley, 
Pierpont, and Starr King. Singularly enough, the church has 
lost by death, while in the service of the church, but a single 
one of its pastors (Dr. Samuel West) since its organization. 
Eev. John Pierpont, one of our native poets, was first a lawyer, 
and then a merchant. In the late civil war, though past his 
" threescore and ten," he joined a Massachusetts regiment as 
chaplain. He died at Medford, in 1866, while holding a clerk- 
ship in the Treasury Department at Washington. Thomas Starr 
King was but twenty-four when he assumed the pastorate of 
Hollis Street, and after twelve years of service removed to San 
Francisco, where he bore a prominent part in arraying Cali- 
fornia in active sympathy with the North during the civil war. 
A number of works have emanated from the pen of this gifted 
and lamented author and divine, of which the White Hills is 
perhaps the best known, and most enjoyable. 

It is a singular fact that in only two instances the (Han- 
over Street IMethodist and Hollis Street) have three churches 
been erected on the same spot in Boston. The New Xorth, 
Old South, Brattle Square, Bromfield Street, Bulfmch Street, 



416 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

West, Baldwin Place, Phillips, Maverick, and Trinity churclies, 
Baptist Bethel, and King's Chapel, are the second edifices on 
the same site. 

Zachariah TVHiitman, in his History of the Ancient and Hon- 
orable Artillery, says, — 

" The erection of pews on the ground-floor of meeting-houses was 
a New England invention. Some of the first meeting-houses in 
Boston that had pews had no broad or other aisle, but were entered 
from without by a door, the owner keeping the key." 

The tablets in Hollis Street Church bearing the Ten Com- 
mandments were the gift of Benjamin Bussey. 

The terrible fire of 1787 laid waste the whole of the region 
around Hollis Street. It commenced in William Patten's malt- 
house in Beach Street, extending with great rapidity in a 
southerly direction. The spire of Hollis Street Church soon 
took fire from the burning flakes carried through the air, and 
the church was burnt to the ground. Both sides of Washing- 
ton Street, from Eliot to Common on the west, and from Beach 
to a point opposite Common Street on the east, were laid in 
ruins. This fire cost the town a hundred houses, of which 
sixty were dwellings. Subscriptions were set on foot for the 
sufferers, and the Marquis Lafayette, with characteristic gener- 
osity, gave £ 350 sterling towards the relief of the sufterers. 

The British, it is said, on their retreat from the works on the 
Neck left a rear-guard at Hollis Street, who had orders, if the 
Americans broke through the tacit convention between Wash- 
ington and How^e, to fire a train laid to Hollis Street Church, 
which had served them as a barrack. This guard, after remain- 
ing a short time at their post, took to their heels, and scampered 
off under the impression that the Yankees were close upon 
them. 

We conclude our chapter with a visit to another poet, 
Charles Sprague, now in his eighty-first year, who resides, in 
the evening of his life, at No. 636, on the east side of Wash- 
ington Street, in a substantial old-fashioned house. 

It has been stated that the oration which Mr. Sprague de- 
livered July 4th, 1825, before the city authorities was afterwards 



LIBERTY TREE AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD. 417 

effectively used on a similar occasion as an original production 
by a Western Cicero, who might have worn his laurels undis- 
covered had he not in an unguarded moment furnished a copy 
for the press. 

Mr. Sprague went to the Franklin School when Lemuel 
Shaw, the late Chief Justice, was usher there. He became con- 
nected with the State Bank in 1820, and subsequently cashier 
of the Globe when that bank was organized. His first poetical 
essay, by which his name came before the public, was a prize 
prologue, delivered at the opening of the Park Theatre, New 
York, of which the following is an extract : — 

" The Stage ! where Fancy sits, creative qiieen. 
And waves her sceptre o'er life's mimic scene ; 
Where young-eyed Wonder comes to feast his sight, 
And quaff instruction while he drinks delight. 
The Stage ! that threads each labyrinth of the soul, 
Wakes laughter's peal, and bids the tear-drop roll ; 
That shoots at Folly, mocks proud Fashion's slave, 
Uncloaks the hypocrite, and brands the knave." 



18* 



418 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



CHAPTEE XV. 

THE NECK AND THE FORTIFICATIONS. 

The Neck described, — Measures to protect the Road. — Paving the Neck. 

— Henry T. Tuckerman. — Old Houses vs. Modern. —Massachusetts Mint. 

— The Gallows. — Anecdote of Warren. — Executions. — Early Fortifica- 
tions. — The British Works and Armament. — American Works. — George 
Tavern. — Wasliington's Staff. — His Personal Traits. — Washington 
House. — Washington Hotel. — Anecdotes of George Tavern. — Scarcity 
of Powder. — Continental Flags, — Entry of Washington's Army. -^ 
Entry of Rochambeau's Army. — Paul Jones. 

WE have conducted the reader through all of Colonial 
Boston embraced within the peninsula, and are now to 
survey the barrier which the colonists raised against the power 
of the mighty British Empire. The more we examine the 
resources and state of preparation of the people, the more we 
are astonished at the hardihood with which a mere collection 
of the yeomanry of the country, without any pretension to the 
name of an army, sat down before the gates of the town of 
Boston, and compelled the haughty Britons to retire from her 
profaned temples and ruined hearthstones. 

A strip of territory lying along the great avenue to the main- 
land still retains the appellation of *' The ISTeck." Long may 
the only battle-ground within our ancient limits preserve the 
name by which it was known to Wintln^op and to Washington. 
All Boston proper was once styled " The Neck," in distinction 
from Noddle's Island, Brookline, and other territory included 
within the jurisdiction. The peninsula outgrowing her de- 
pendencies, the name attached itself to the narrow isthmus 
connecting with the mainland. 

The Neck may be said to have begun at Beach Street, where 
was its greatest breadth, diminishing to its narrowest point at 
Dover Street, increasing gradually in width to the neighborhood 



THE NECK AND THE FORTIFICATIONS. 419 

of JOecIham Street, thence expanding in greater proportion to 
the Hne at the. present car stables nearly opposite Metropolitan 
Place. The Neck, according to its designation in Revolution- 
ary times, was that part lying south of Dover Street. 

Captain Nathaniel Uring, in his account of his visit to Bos- 
ton in 1710, printed in London in 1726, says : — 

" The Neck of Land betwixt the city and country is about forty 
yards broad, and so low that the spring tides sometimes wash the 
road, which might, with little charge, be made so strong as not to be 
forced, there being no way of coming at it by land but over that 
Neck." 

Whether what constituted old Boston was at one time an 
island, or was becoming one by the wasting forces of the ele- 
ments, is an interesting question for geologists. We know that 
for nearly a hundred and fifty years scarcely any change had 
taken place in the appearance of the Neck ; but the action, of 
the town authorities seems to indicate a fear that its existence 
was seriously threatened. 

Within the recollection of persons now living the water has 
been known to stand up to the knees of horses in the season 
of full tides at some places in the road, on the Neck. The 
narrowest part was naturally the most exposed, as it was the 
most eligible also for fortifying. At some points along the 
beach there was a good depth of water, and Gibben's shipyard 
was located on the easterly side a short distance north of Dover 
Street as early as 1722, and as late as 1777. Other portions, 
on both sides of the Neck, were bordered by marshes, more 
or less extensive, covered at high tides. 

AVharves were built at intervals along the eastern shore, 
from Beach to Dover Street. In front of these wharves dwell-. 
ings and stores were erected, facing what is now Washington 
Street. Josiah Knapp's dwelling, recently removed from the 
corner of Kneeland Street, was one of these, his wharf being 
so near the street that the passers-by complained that the bow- 
sprits of his vessels unlading there obstructed the higliway. 

In the spring the road upon the Neck was almost impassable, 
especially before the centre was paved, which was from neces- 



420 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

sity done at last, but with such large stones that the pavement 
was always avoided by vehicles as long as the old road was 
practicable. 

Measures began to be very early considered to protect the 
Neck from the violence of the sea. In 1 708 the town granted 
a number of individuals all the tract included within Castle and 
a point a little north of Dover Street, conditioned upon the 
completion of a highway and erection of certain barriers to 
"secure and keep off the sea." A second grant was made 
nearly eighty years later for a like purpose, extending from the 
hmits of the first grant to a point a little beyond the former 
estate of John D. Williams, Esq., where the Cathedral now 
stands. From this beginning dates the reclamation of that 
extensive area now covered in every direction with superb 
public edifices or private mansions. 

A dike was built on the exposed eastward side, crossing the 
marshes to the firm ground on the Eoxbury shore, before the 
Eevolution, which traversed both the British and American 
works on the Neck. This followed in general direction the 
extension of Harrison Avenue. A sea-wall was built about 
the same time on the west side, for some distance south from 
the bridge at Dover Street, nearly as far as Waltham Street. 
In a word, the general appearance of the Neck sixty years ago, 
to a spectator placed at the Old Fortifications, was similar to 
the turnpikes crossing the Lynn marshes to-day, and was deso- 
late and forbidding in the extreme, especially to a nocturnal 
traveller. 

From the old fortifications, northwardly, the highway was 
called Orange Street as early as 1 708. Washington Street was 
named after the memorable visit of the General in 1789, and at 
first extended only from near Dover Street to Eoxbury line ; 
the name was not applied to the whole extent of the present 
thoroughfare until 1824, when Cornhill, Marlborough, New- 
bury, and Orange became one in name as well as in fact. 

Few of the thousands who daily traverse the Neck, with its 
street-cars, omnibuses, and private equipages following each 
other in rapid succession, can realize that travellers were once 



THE NECK AND THE FORTIFICATIONS. 421 

in great clanger of losing their way along the narrow natural 
causeway and its adjacent marshes. Yet so frec^uent had such 
accidents become that not only the town but the General Court 
took action in 1723 to have the dangerous road fenced in. 

The Xeck marshes were a favorite resort for birds, and were 
much frequented by sportsmen. It is related that Sir Charles 
and Lady Frankland one day narrowly escaped being shot as 
they were passing over the highway. In 1785 the town of 
Eoxbury was obliged to place sentinels here to prevent the 
desecration of the Sabbath. The meadows continued in much 
later times to be a resort for this purpose. 

The Neck was paved quite early in the last century, accord- 
ing to the fashion we have described elsewhere. In 1757 the 
General Court authorized a lottery to raise funds for paving and 
repairing the highway. The forty-two rods of Orange Street, 
mentioned as having been ordered paved in 1715, were probably 
the portion nearest the town, but it was paved in 1775 as far 
as the British works. The whole Neck was paved under the 
mayoralty of Josiah Quincy. 

In colonial times the fortification which was raised a little 
south of Dover Street was the limit of the town, — all beyond 
was nearly in its primitive condition. In 1794 there Avere but 
eighteen buildings between Dover Street and the line. In 
1800 there were not more than one or two houses from the site 
of the new Catholic Cathedral to Roxbury. The few buildings 
standing between the American and British lines were burnt 
during the siege, and only two barns and three small houses 
were then left on what was properly termed the Xeck. 

A few doors north of Dover Street, on the easterly side of 
wdiat was then old Orange Street, w^is the home of the favorite 
author and poet, Henry T. Tuckerman. The house was struck 
during the siege by a shot from the American lines. jNIr. Tuck- 
erman has contributed largely to our literature both in verse 
and prose, as an essayist, critic, biographer, and accomplished 
traveller. He was also well known through his articles in our 
leading magazines. As a poet, his " Eome " gives a good sam- 
ple of his style. 



422 



LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 



" A terrace lifts above the People's Square 
Its colonnade ; 
About it lies the wami and crystal air. 
And fir-trees' shade." 

This house, hke most of those on our main avenue in the 
beginning of the century, stood end to the street, which gave 
a singular impression to a stranger, and recalls the following 
quaint description of Albany by old Jedediah Morse, which 
has given rise to a witticism on the peculiarity of the inhabi- 
tants of that town : — 

" This city and suburbs, by enumeration in 1797, contained 1,263 
buildings, of which 863 were dwelling-houses, aud 6,021 inhabitants. 
Many of them are in the Gothic style, with the gable end to the 
street, which custom the first settlers brought from Holland ; the 
new houses are built in the modern style." 

The only purpose of utility for which the T^eck was formerly 
used, except perhaps the grazing afforded by the marshes along 
the causeway, was for brick- making. There were brickyards 
north of Dover Street, as well as south, j3efore the Eevolution. 
These gave employment to many poor people during the con- 
tinuance of the Port Act. In this connection we may mention 
the total absence of building-stone of any kind on the site of 
original Boston. The principal elevations have been either 
wholly or partially removed without encountering a ledge of 
any description. 

In October, 1786, the State of Massachusetts, being greatly 
in want of a specie currency, passed an act to establish a mint 

for tlie coinage 
of copper, silver, 
and gold. This 
was one of the 
powers of sover- 
eignty whicli the 
States continued 
to exercise under 
the old "Arti- 
cles of Confed- 




eration. 



MAoSACHUSETTS CENT OF 1787. 

Joshua Wetherle was appointed master of the mint 



THE NECK AND THE FORTIFICATIONS. 428 

in INIay, 1787, and authorized to erect the necessary works and 
machinery. $70,000 in cents and half-cents were ordered to 
be struck as soon as practicable. 

Wetherle established his works on the IS'eck, in the rear of 
what is now Eollins Street, and at Dedham, the copper being 
first carted to Dedham to be rolled, and then brought back to 
Boston to be coined. In July, 1787, the national government 
established the devices of its copper coin. 

Early in 1788 the copper coin ordered by the State began to 
be issued, but only a few thousand dollars of the large amount 
ordered were put in circulation before the work was suspended 
by the State in consequence of the adoption of the Federal 
Constitution, which reserved the right to coin money to the 
general government. The emblems on the ^lassachusetts cent 
and half-cent were the same. One side bore the American 
eagle with a bundle of arrows in the right talon and an olive- 
branch in the left, with a shield on the breast, on which is the 
word " cent " ; the word " Massachusetts " encircling the bor- 
der. The reverse represents a full-length Indian grasping liis 
bow and arrow, but, as jNIr. Felt remarks, considerably imj^roved 
in appearance since he appeared on the colony seal. A star 
appears near the head, as in the State seal, emblematic of one 
of the United States, and the word " Commonwealth " com- 
pletes the device. 

The first object which arrested the attention of the traveller 
as he journeyed towards Old Boston was the gallows, standing 
as a monument of civilization at the gates. It was at first 
situated near the old fortification on the easterly side of the 
^eck, but stood at a later period not far from the site of the St. 
James Hotel. 

A characteristic anecdote is related of Dr. AVarren in connec- 
tion with the gallows. It is said that as he was one day passing 
the spot he met some British officers, one of whom exclaimed, 
" Go on, Warren, you will soon come to the gallows." Warren 
immediately turned back and demanded to know which of them 
had thus accosted him, but neither of the warriors had the 
courage to avow it. 



424 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

Here were hanged the pirates John Williams, Francis Fred- 
erick, John P. Eog, and Niles Peterson, in 1819 ; and in the 
following year Michael Powers was also executed for the mur- 
der of Timothy Kennedy. Perez Morton was then district- 
attorney. Powers was defended by Daniel Webster, but was 
convicted, on an unbroken chain of circumstantial evidence, 
of having murdered and then buried his victim in a cellar. 

The defences of Boston very early engaged the attention of 
the settlers. Fort Hill was fortified as early as 1634, and steps 
were taken to build a work on Castle Island in the same year. 
It is reasonable to conclude that the protection of the land side 
received even earlier attention, the danger being more imminent. 
The Indians in the neighborhood were, as a general thing, 
friendly, but were not trusted, and a guard of an officer and six 
men was placed on the Neck, by order of the court, in April, 
1631. We cannot, however, fix the date with precision, though 
a barrier was certainly erected prior to 1640. The gates of the 
old fortification were constantly guarded, and were shut by a 
certain hour in the evening, after which none were allowed to 
pass in or out. 

The primitive barrier had disappeared before 1710, the 
broken power of the Indians leaving nothing to apprehend 
from that quarter. In this year the town voted that a line of 
defence be forthwith made across the Neck, between Boston 
and Roxbury. A suitable number of great guns were ordered 
to be mounted, and a gate erected across the road. The foun- 
dation of this work was of stone and brick, with parapet of 
earth ; part of what was considered to be the remains of the 
old fort was uncovered in 1860, when excavations were making 
in the street, just south of Williams Market. 

In September, 1774, when matters were approaching a crisis 
between the people and the King's troops, Gage began to fortify 
the Neck. The remains of the old works were strengthened, 
guns mounted, and earthworks thrown up some distance in 
advance of these on both sides of the highway. The armament 
at first consisted of two twenty-four and eight nine pounders. 
The first troops stationed by Gage in this quarter were the 



THE NECK AND THE FORTIFICATIONS. 425 

59tli regiment, which arrived from Salem September 2, and 
encamped on the JN'eck. On the 4th four pieces of held artil- 
lery were taken from the Common and placed in front of the 
troops, fiitigue parties from which went to work upon the in- 
trenchments. By midwinter the ordinary garrison was one 
hundred and fifty men, with a field-officer in command. This 
force was increased before the battle of Lexington to three 
hundred and forty men. A deep fosse, into which the tide 
flowed at high water, was dug in front of the Dover Street fort, 
converting Boston for the time into two islands. 

In July, 1775, when the siege had fairly begun, the work 
nearest the town mounted eight twenty-four, six twelve, two 
nine, and seven six pounder guns, and was called during the 
siege " The Green Store Battery," from the warehouse of 
Deacon Brown, painted that color, which stood on the site of 
the Williams Market. The advanced work, which was much 
the stronger, mounted eight twenty-four, four twelve, one 
nine, and seven six pounders, with six eight-inch howitzers, 
and a mortar battery. The road passed directly through the 
centre of both lines, the first being closed by a gate and draw- 
bridge. The redan was flanked by a bastion on each side of 
the highway, from which the lines were continued across the 
intervening marshes to the sea. Floating batteries, abattis, 
trous-de-loup, and other appliances known to military science, 
were not wanting. Two guard -houses were on either side of 
the road immediately in the rear of the advanced post, while a 
third and smaller work, lying between the others on the eastern 
sea-margin, bore on Dorchester Xeck, and took the left curtain 
and bastion of the main work in reverse. Above all waved the 
standard of England. 




BRITISH LINES ON BOSTON NECK IN 1775. 

The position of the main British work, vestiges of which 
were distinctly visible as late as 1822, particularly on the west 



426 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

side of the Xeck, was between Dedliam and Canton Streets. 
Mounds, ramparts, and wide ditches yet attested the strength 
of the defences which Washington deemed too formidable to 
be carried by assault. Eemains of planks and poles used to 
support the embankment of what may have been one of the 
bastions were discovered many years since in digging the cellar 
of Edward D. Peters's house on the north corner of Canton and 
Washington Streets. Mr. John Griggs, whose recollections of 
the Neck go back more than half a century, remembers traces 
of the intrenchments on the east side, where we have located 
them. The visitor to the spot will not fail to observe that 
from this point the first unobstructed view is obtained in front 
as far as Washington Market. 

By Washington's order Colonel Gridley rendered these works 
useless as soon as the Continental army moved to New York, 
so that if the enemy, whose fleet was still on the coast, should 
suddenly repossess themselves of Boston, they might not find 
the old defences available. From this stronghold Gage, Howe, 
Clinton, and Burgoyne grimly marked the rising intrenchments 
of the Americans three quarters of a mile away, or listened to 
the roll of the drums that greeted the approach of their chief- 
tain as he made his daily tour of the hostile lines. Gage at 
one time appears to have intrusted the defence of his lines on 
the Neck to Lord Percy. 

Colonel Trumbull, afterwards one of Washington's military 
family, but then belonging to a Connecticut regiment, first 
brought himself to the notice of the general by a daring ex- 
ploit. Learning that a plan of the enemy's works was greatly 
desired at headquarters, he crept near enough to them to make 
a drawing, with which he returned to camp. For this act he 
was appointed aide-de-camp. A British soldier of artillery soon 
after came into the American lines with a plan of the hostile 
forts. From the time of the investment Tintil the siege was 
raised, rigid martial law prevailed in Boston, with sentinels 
posted at all important points, patrols traversing the streets, 
and a town major at the head of police affairs. 

Here Gage remained ignobly shut up, attempting nothing 



THE NECK AND THE FORTIFICATIONS. 427 

after the battle of Bunker Hill but a few marauding excursions 

along the coast in search of fresh provisions. His extremities 

are ludicrously set forth by that inimitable Revolutionary poet, 

Philip Freneau. The scene is a midnight consultation at the 

general's quarters. 

" The clock strikes two ! — Gage smote upon his breast, 
And cry'd, — ' What fate determines must be best — 
But now attend — a counsel I impart 
That long has laid the heaviest at my heart — 
Three weeks — ye gods ! nay, three long years it seems — 
Since roast-beef I have touch'd, except in dreams. 
In sleep, choice dishes to my view repair ; 
Waking, I gape and champ the empty air, — ■ 
Say, is it just that I, who rule these bands, 
Should live on husks, like rakes in foreign lands ? " 

The space between the opposing works became a battle- 
ground for the skirmishing parties of the two armies, each of 
which had pickets in their front, covered by slight intrench- 
ments. A short distance in advance of the British works on the 
west side of the highway were the house and barns of a Mr. 
Brown, which served the British admirably as a post from 
which to annoy our men. This was the house at which Bur- 
goyne proposed to meet Charles Lee, to discuss the differences 
between the colonies and the mother countr}^ Congress, how- 
ever, put a veto on a proceeding neither military nor diplo- 
matic. On the 8th of July (1775) Majors Tupper and Crane 
surprised the guard and destroyed the house and out-bidldings. 
The bare chimneys remained standing, and to some extent af- 
forded a protection to the enemy. 

After the battle of Lexington the Americans at first merely 
guarded the passage of the Xeck with a small force under 
Colonel Robinson, or until the Provincial Congress took meas- 
ures to organize an army, and regular military operations were 
undertaken. 

No intrenchments apjiear to have been thrown up on the 
Neck by the Continental forces until after the battle of Bun- 
ker Hill, when the famous Roxbury lines were laid out by 
Colonel Richard Gridley, the veteran of Louisburg, Quebec, and 
Bunker Hill, now chief-engineer of the army. 



428 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

From the best evidence to be obtained these lines were 
situated on the rising ground a little north of the old monu- 
ment on the line of division between Boston and Roxbury, and 
near Clifton Place. An abattis was formed of trees felled with 
the tops pointed towards Boston, as an obstacle to the much- 
dreaded Light Horse, — a needless precaution, for this choice 
band of heroes never appeared outside their defences. The 
embankments were strengthened with planks filled between 
with earth. The works were bastioned, and rested with either 
flank on arms of the sea. 

The American advanced post was first at the George Tavern, 
which stood a little south of the site of the present Washington 
Market, and was burnt by a British sally on the night of Sun- 
day, July 30, 1775. 

The George Tavern, sometimes called the St. George, which 
we have had occasion to mention in connection with the recep- 
tions of some of the royal governors, was included in an estate 
of more than eighteen acres, extending nearly or quite to Rox- 
bury line on the south and across the marshes to the great 
creek, which formed its boundary on the west. It had or- 
chards, gardens, and a site which commanded a vieAv of the town 
of Boston and the harbor on one hand, and Cambridge Bay 
with the shores of the mainland on the other. While it re- 
mained, but few travellers might venture over the gloomy 
Neck, over which the cold winds swept with violence, without 
a pause under its hospitable roof. 

The George is noted in the history of the Colony as the 
place of meeting of the General Court in 1721, perhaps on 
account of the prevalence of the small-pox in Boston in that 
year, when it raged with frightful violence. In 1730, while it 
was kept by Simon Rogers, the Probate Court was held there. 
Rogers continued to be landlord until 1734. It was kept at 
different times by Gideon Gardner and Samuel Mears, and in 
1769 by Edward Bardin, Mdio changed the name to the King's 
Arms, a title it retained but a short time. In 1 788 a tavern 
was reopened on or near the site of the George, but was not of 
long continuance. 



THE NECK AND THE FORTIFICATIONS. 429 

Before the destruction of the tavern the Americans threw up 
a work a Httle below where it had stood, and witliin musket- 
range of the British outpost. To this point it was Washington's 
daily custom to proceed, accompanied by his personal staff, com- 
posed of men subsequently famous in Revolutionary annals. 
There ^svas Mifflin, tirst aide-de-camp, afterwards governor of 
Pennsylvania, Avho, as president of the Congress in 1783, re- 
ceived the resignation of his old chief; Joseph Reed of Phila- 
delphia, his trusted friend and secretary ; and Horatio Gates, 
whose military experience enabled him to fill acceptably the 
arduous post of adjutant-general, and bring a little order out 
of the chaos that prevailed in the American camp. 

General Washington's uniform at this time was " a blue coat 
Tvdth buff-colored facings, a rich epaulet on each shoulder, 
buff under-dress, and an elegant small-sword ; a black cockade 
in his hat." "* It was at this point, from which he had, in 1775, 
daily viewed the inactivity of his enemy with a surprise he has 
not concealed in his letters, that the general, in 1789, then 
become President, mounted his famous white charger, a present 
from Charles IV. of Spain, and, attended by his secretaries. 
Colonel Lear and Major Jackson, made his last entry into Bos- 
ton. 

Probably no great personage has ever lived whose career has 
afforded fewer anecdotes to his biographer then General Wash- 
ington. The calm dignity of his manner repelled every at- 
tempt at familiarity, but this dignity w^as in no way associated 
with hauteur. It is related that Gouverneur Morris, having 
undertaken once the hazardous experiment of accosting the 
President unceremoniously, declared that nothing would induce 
him to repeat the attempt. The French officers who served 
with Rochambeau were at once captivated by Washington's 
noble presence and gracious manner. 

The Washington Market stands on the site of the Washing- 
ton House, in which Mrs. Rowson once kept her school for 
young ladies, and which, under the control of the Cooleys, 
father and son, became a much-frequented resort for sleighing- 
* Thacher's Military Journal. 



430 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

parties, when the ISTeck was the course to which, in winter, the 
beauty and fashion of the town repaired. 

Next south of the market is a three-story brick building, 
kept as a tavern as far back as 1820, and known first as Wash- 
ington Hall, and subsequently as the Washington Hotel. It 
was kept in 1837, and for some time subsequently, by Amherst 
Eaton of Concert Hall. Both of these houses were on the 
George Tavern estate. 

In 1737 the following petition was presented by Stephen 
Minot to be allowed a license to sell liquors at his tavern on 
the Neck (supposed to be the George Tavern). It was allowed. 

" That your petitioner lately met with very heavy losses by the 
way of the sea it stands him in stead to put his estate on the land 
to the best improvement he possibly can in a way of Trade &c. 
And as he designs to keep for sale a variety of goods suitable for the 
country, So he apprehends it will but little avail him unless he may 
be permitted to supply his customers with Rum also, because they 
usually chuse to take up all they want at one place." 

Thacher, who was a surgeon of Colonel Jackson's regiment 
in the old war, relates an amusing incident of the arrival of 
that regiment at Boston after a forced march from Providence, 
E. I. : — 

" A severe rain all night did not much impede our march, but the 
troops were broken down with fatigue. We reached Boston at sun- 
rising, and near the entrance of the Neck is a tavern, having for its 
sign a representation of a globe, with a man in the act of struggling 
to get through it ; his head and shoulders were out, his arms ex- 
tended, and the rest of his body enclosed in the globe. On a label 
from his mouth was written, ' Oh ! how shall I get through this 
world 1 ' This was read by the soldiers, and one of them exclaimed, 
'List, d — n you, list, and you will soon get through this world ; our 
regiment will be through it in an hour or two if we don't halt by 
the way.' " 

The scarcity of powder within the American lines during the 
siege of Boston is connected with an incident not without 
interest. At first, a few country people were allowed to pass 
into town with provisions, after , undergoing a search at the 
British post at the Green Store. Market-wagons were but little 



THE NECK AND THE FORTIFICATIONS. 431 

used, the farmers riding on horseback with panniers containing 
their marketing. George Minot, of Dorchester, from his fre- 
quent visits was well known to the guard, who allowed him to 
pass without examination. Had they looked into the honest 
man's panniers, they would have found them well filled with 
" villanous saltpetre," which he was, at great personal risk, 
conveying to his friends. The money to buy the powder was 
furnislied by IMinot's father, John ]\Iinot, a selectman of Dor- 
chester. The government afterwards acknowledged and paid 
the claim, with which Minot jDurchased a part of Thompson's 
Island. 

It is a matter of history that, within musket-shot of twenty 
British regiments, Washington's whole army was disbanded 
and reorganized; it is no less true that in August, 1775, the 
entire supply of powder was only nine rounds per man. Wash- 
ington's letters at this time are fidl of anxiety. 

The flags used by the Americans during the siege of Boston 
have always been a subject of much interest. The flag of thir- 
teen stripes was first raised on the heights near Boston, prob- 
ably at or near the commander-in-chief's headquarters, January 
2, 1776. Letters from Boston at this time say that the regidars 
did not understand it ; and, as the king's speech had just been 
sent to the Americans, they thought the new flag was a token 
of submission. The British Annual Eegister of 1776 says, 
more correctly, that the provincials burnt the king's speech, and 
changed their colors from the plain red ground they had hith- 
erto used to a flag with thirteen stripes, as a symbol of the 
number and union of tlie colonies. This was, without doubt, 
the flag that, on the 17th IVIarch, 1776, waved over the Old 
State House and Province House, and was borne in the van of 
the American troops. 

The Pine Tree, Pattlesnake, and striped flag were used indis- 
criminately until July, 1777, when the blue union, TNath the 
stars, was added to the stripes, and the flag established by law. 
The private arms of Washington, bearing three stars in the 
upper portion, and three bars across the escutcheon, were 
thought to have had some connection Avith the flag, but this 
does not appear probable. 



432 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

" Forever float that standard sheet ! 

Where breathes the foe but falls before us ? 
With freedom's soil beneath our feet, 

And freedom's banner streaming o'er us ! " 

The first troops to enter the town after the evacuation were 
five hundred men, under command of Colonel Ebenezer Learned, 
who unbarred and opened the gates of the British works. 
General Ward accompanied this detachment. They found the 
Neck thickly scattered with " crows'-feet " to impede their ad- 
vance. At the same time a detachment under General Putnam, 
with whom was Colonel John Stark, landed at the foot of the 
Common, and to the old wolf-hunter belongs the honor of first 
commanding in Boston as the successor of Sir William Howe. 
On the 20th the main army marched in, and on the 2 2d such 
of the inhabitants as had been separated from their friends 
during the ten months' siege thronged into the town. Putnam 
took possession of and garrisoned all the posts. 

Washington himself entered Boston the day after the evacu- 
ation, but, as the small-pox prevailed in town, the army did 
not march in until the 20th, as stated. By Washington's order, 
works were thrown up on Fort Hill, and those defending from 
the country were demolished. The general remained ten days 
in Boston. He attended the meetings of the Legislature, and 
on the 28th, accompanied by the other general officers and their 
suites, marched in procession from the Council Chamber to the 
Old Brick Church, where appropriate services were held, after 
which a dinner was provided for the general and his officers at 
the Bunch of Grapes, in King Street. During his stay Wash- 
ington reviewed the Continental troops on the Common. 

The first national medal voted by Congress was presented to 
General Washington for his successful conduct of the siege of 
Boston, by a resolution passed March 25, 1776. It was struck 
in Paris from a die by Duvivier. 

Wilkes, in a speech delivered in Parliament on the evacua- 
tion, said : " All the military men of this country now confess 
that the retreat of General Howe from Boston was an absolute 
flight ; as much so, sir, as that of Mahomet from Mecca." 

One other grand martial pageant of the Eevolutionary period 



THE NECK AND THE FORTIFICATIONS. 433 

remains to be chronicled. This was the entry of Ilochambeau's 
forces into Boston in December, 1782. The army was com- 
manded by the brave General Baron de Viomenil, Kochambeau 
having taken leave of his troops at Providence, returning with 
a part of his staff to France. 

The French army was divided into four grand divisions, to 
which was added the field artillery. The second division was 
the first to arrive in the neighborhood of Boston, on the 4th, 
the first and third on the 5th, and the fourth on the 6th. The 
artillery did not arrive until the 18th. A few desertions oc- 
curred on the march, and the officers were obliged to exercise 
the greatest vigilance, as many of the poor fellows preferred 
remaining in the country to embarking for an unknown desti- 
nation. 

JS'otwithstanding it was midwinter, the troops, before enter- 
ing the town on the 7th, changed their dress in the open air, 
and appeared in such splendid array as gave but little hint of 
their long, weary march from Yorktown. Their welcome was 
enthusiastic and heartfelt. At a town-meeting held Saturday, 
December 7, of which Samuel Adams was moderator, James 
Sullivan and Samuel Barret, with the selectmen, were appointed 
a committee to wait on General Yiomenil with an address of 
welcome, to which the Baron returned a courteous reply. 

"What shall be said of the editorial and reportorial enterprise 
of that day? Beyond the brief notice we have given of the action 
in town-meeting, — and that appears as an advertisement, — 
there is not a single line referring to the entry in the columns 
of the Independent Chronicle, then published in Boston, nor 
any clew to a sojourn of seventeen days in the news department ; 
the other two papers dismiss the affiiir each with half a dozen 
lines. Such an event would now occupy the greater part of 
one of our mammoth journals ; not the smallest scrap of 
information would be too trivial, not a button would escape 
scrutiny. To the greater enterprise of Isaiah Thomas's jNIas- 
sachusetts Spy, and particularly to its Boston correspondent, 
regular or special, who writes under date of December 12, 1782, 
we are indebted for the following : — 

19 BB 



434 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

" Last week arrived in town from the southward, in four divisions, 
the troops of our generous ally, the King of France. A finer corps 
of men never paraded the streets of Boston in the infamous adminis- 
trations of Bernard, Hutchinson, and Gage. The quiet, peaceable, and 
orderly behavior of these troops during their long march sufficiently 
contradicts the infamous falsehoods and misrepresentations usually 
imposed on the world by perfidious Britons, who have often led us 
to entertain an unfavorable opinion of the French troops. We are 
happily convinced that such a character belongs wholly and only to 
the troops employed by the Royal Despot of Britain." 

The day was favorable, and the sunbeams danced and glit- 
tered on the bayonets of these veterans of two continents as 
they proudly marched over the Neck and through the modest 
streets of Old Boston. At their head rode Viomenil, who 
achieved such renown at Yorktown, and afterwards lost his life 
heroically defending his king at the attack on the Tuileries. 
At his side rode the Chevalier Alexander de Lameth, severely 
wounded at Yorktown, and afterwards a soldier of jS'apoleon ; 
the Marquis de Champcenetz ; Count Mathieu Dumas ; Alex- 
ander Bertliier, afterwards the adjutant-general and confidant 
of [Kapoleon, but deserting him in the hour of adversity; 
Lynch, the intrepid Englishman, who served in the ranks of 
France, and many others who gained renown in the wars 
into which that nation was shortly after plunged. The offi- 
cers wore singular-looking, two-cornered cocked hats with the 
white cockade, the uniform being white broadcloth, with fa- 
cings of red, blue, or green, according to the corps to which 
they belonged ; the general alone wore a blue overdress faced 
with red. All the officers wore high military boots, were 
splendidly mounted, and their equipments and side-arms were 
elegant and costly. 

A complete band of music accompanied the troops, whose 
martial strains were the first the Bostonians had heard since the 
evacuation by the British forces ; our own army yet marched to 
the music of the fife and drum. 

After these marched the regiment Royal Deux-Ponts, the lar- 
gest in the army, in four battalions, with its colonel, Count 



THE NECK AND THE FORTIFICATIONS. 435 

Christian de Deux-Ponts, from wliom the regiment took its 
name, at its head. Count Christian afterwards commanded the 
Bavarian corps at the battle of Hohenlinden with distinguished 
valor. Count William, second colonel of the same regiment, 
wdio was wounded in the assault on the redoubt at Yorktown, 
where he won the order of Saint Louis, was on his way to 
France with the news of Cornwallis's surrender. The dress of 
this regiment was white. The men wore cocked hats, with 
pompons instead of cockades, woollen epaulets, white cross- 
belts, from which was suspended a short hanger and cartouche- 
box, and spatterdashes ; the hair was worn en queue ; — so far 
the description Avill apply to the whole army, the colors varied 
in all the regiments. 

]!SJ"ext came the Soissonnais, with Count Segur, son of the Min- 
ister at War, and afterwards a peer of France, in their front. 
Segur was colonel en second of the regiment, but his senior, 
Count de Saint Maime, had come into Boston in advance of the 
army. Segur is also known as a historian, and author of his 
own memoirs. 

The regiment Saint-Onge, in white and green, follows, with 
Colonel Count de Custines, who became a general, and the 
Prince de Broglie, second in command. Both fell under the 
axe of the guillotine during the French Revolution. 

The Bourbonnais in black and red, the inftintry of Lauzun, 
all with arms and accoutrements in complete order, crowned 
with the laurels of victory and bearing the white standard and 
golden lilies in their serried ranks, close the brilliant pro- 
cession. 

An episode of this famous entry deserves mention. Young 
Talleyrand Perigord, brother of Prince Talleyrand, was on the 
staff of the Marquis Chastellux, who wished to take him back 
to France ; but the young warrior of eighteen was determined 
to remain with the army, and, having obtained a grenadier's 
uniform, marched in the ranks of the Soissonnais, with his 
haversack on his back and his gun on his shoulder. Talleyrand 
was well known to the superior officers, who pretended not to 
recognize him, and his warlike ardor became the town talk 



436 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

He was christened Va-de-hon-coeur (go willingly), and was the 
subject of many attentions. 

The cavalry of the Duke de Lauzun, which had crossed steel 
with Tarleton's famous troopers and held him at bay at Glouces- 
ter, Virginia, were left behind with Washington's army on the 
Hudson. They carried lances, and were styled Uhlans, — a name 
rendered formidable by the Prussians in the late Franco-German 
war. The uniform of tliis famous corps was a blue hussar 
jacket, with high-crowned round hat. Their leader, the beau- 
ideal of a dashing cavalier, carried the news of the capitulation 
of Cornwallis to the king. When condemned afterwards by 
the tribunal of Fouquier Tinville, a moment before his ex- 
ecution he turned to those who were to suffer with him and said, 
" It is finished, gentlemen : I depart on the great journey." To 
the executioner he offered a glass of wine, saying, " Take it, you 
have need of courage to perform your duty." 

The artillery, although it did not join in the display, must 
not be forgotten. This arm was attired in blue, faced with red, 
with white spatterdashes and red pompons. The men wore the 
short Roman sword, and carried their firelocks by the slings. 
The heavy artillery train remained with the American forces, to 
assist, if necessary, in the reduction of New York. 

A great concourse of people came out to the Neck to welcome 
the gallant Frenchmen, and as the brilliant column moved 
along it was met Avith the liveliest demonstrations of joy and 
affection. Ladies waved their handkerchiefs from the windows, 
and the old streets echoed again with the plaudits of the people. 
Our readers will doubtless agree that, of the many pageants of 
which the Neck has been the theatre, none were so well Avorth 
witnessing as on the day when the superb host of our ally, 
Louis XVI., with closed ranks and firm tread passed into the 
town ; or that other day when, 

" In their ragged regimentals, 
Stood the Old Continentals," 

with little of the pomp of war in their appearance, but "wdth 
the light of victory in every countenance, as they marched in 



THE NECK AND THE FORTIFICATIONS. 437 

triumph through the abandoned works of the enemy, inaugu- 
rating by their valor and constancy tiie hope ol" a successlld 
issue to the conflict just begun. 

The stay of the i'rench was improved by a round of reviews, 
balls, dinners, and receptions. The officers found quarters and 
genuine hospitality among the inhabitants, and the men were 
well cared for. Both officers and men parted with keen regret 
from the friends they had found, — a regret sincerely shared by 
the iidiabitants. At a lire which occurred in the town the 
French displayed such good-will and gallantry in assisting to 
extinguish it that they were publicly thanked. On the 11th, 
Governor Hancock and the council gave one of their solemn 
feasts to the general and field officers, the Marquis de Vaudreuil, 
and principal officers of the fleet. 

The fleet of the Marquis lay in the roads, consisting of the 
eighty gun-ships Le Triomphant, Le Coui'onne, and Le Due de 
Bourgogne ; the seventy-fours L'Hercule, Le Souverain, Le 
Neptune, La Bourgogne, Northumberland, Le Bravo, Le Cit- 
oyen, and the two frigates L'Amazone and La Nereide. 

At this time the squadron was joined by a most notable vol- 
unteer in John Paid Jones, who was, at his own solicitation, 
permitted to accompany M. de Vaudreuil. He was received 
with distinction by the ^larquis on board his own vessel, Le 
Triomphant, and lodged with the Baron Yiomenil. The des- 
tination of the squadron — a secret which was well kept — was 
Jamaica. On the 24th of December the fleet set sail from 
Boston for the rendezvous at Porto Cabello, which after nu- 
merous disasters it reached in February. While lying there. 
Paid Jones fell dangerously ill of the fever. Peace ensued before 
the fleet of D'Estaing, which Avas to co-operate, arrived from 
Cadiz. It will be remembered that Jones was compelled, by a 
resolution of Congress, to surrender the America, the building 
of which he had for sixteen months superintended, to ^I. de 
Vaudreuil, to replace Le Magnifique, which had belonged to the 
fleet of the Marquis. 

The reader, who has patiently followed us in the attempt to 
reconstruct to some extent the Boston of our fathers, to rebuild 



438 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. 

in imagination their habitations, and to revive their venerable 
customs, may, in a measure, realize those changes which have 
svi^ept over the ancient peninsula, and wellnigli totally effaced 
its landmarks ; and while he feels a just pride in that growth 
which is the expression of power, he may yet render due tribute 
to the solid traits and heroic deeds of those antique characters 
who laid the foundations deep and permanent on which have 
risen the Metropolis of New England. 



INDEX. 



INDEX 



Abbott, Colonel, 379. 

Academy of Music, first established in 
Boston, 259. 

Adams, Charles Francis, birthplace, 
319 ; public services, 321 ; marries, 
321. 

Adams Express Company, 76, 80. 

Adams Hall. See Boylston Hall. 

Adams House, site and name of, 392. 

Adams, John, 39, 60 ; incident of his 
nomination of Washington to com- 
mand the army, 73, 82, 89, 100 ; res- 
idence, 125, 126, 148, 181, 196, 201 ; 
sails for France, 221, 230 ; defends 
Preston, 249, 309 ; description of 
Hutchinson's Council, 347, 353, 355, 
357 ; office, 402. 

Adams, John Quincy, library of, 37, 39, 
125, 201 ; residence, 319 ; sketch of, 

319 ; incidents of mission to Russia, 

320 ; Lafayette visits, 364 ; names 
frigate Brandy wine, 382 ; office, 402 ; 
lays corner-stone of Boylston Market, 
403, 404. 

Adams, Laban, innkeeper, 392. 

Adams, Samuel, 57, 69, 71 ; presides 
at Civic Feast, 110 ; proscribed, 125 ; 
portrait, 140, 149, 214, 220 ; at Tea 
Party Meeting, 229 ; resemblance to 
General Gage, 243, 248 ; opposed to 
theatres, 261 ; birthplace, 281 ; fire- 
ward, 295, 297 ; residence and sketch 
of, 308, 309 ; drafts State Constitu- 
tion, 309 ; Governor of Massachu- 
setts, 309 ; death, 309 ; anecdote of, 
309 ; personal appearance, 309 ; de- 
scription of hi 5 birthplace, 309 ; lays 



comer-stone of New State House, 
344; bust of, 345, 348, 372, 401, 
406, 433. 

Adams, Samuel, senior, 380. 

Adams School, 314. 

Adams, Seth, printing-office, 253. 

Adams Street (Kilby), 109. 

Adams, W. T., 392. 

Adelphi Theatre, 74. 

Admiral Duff, ship, 211. 

Admiral Vernon Tavern, 111 ; kept 
by, 112. 

Adventure, Galley (Kidd's vessel), 
78. 

Advertiser Building, 79. 

Albion, 56. 

Alboni, Madame,- 394. 

Alden Court, 371. 

Alcott, A. Bronson, school, 312. 

Alcott, Louisa May, 312. 

Alert, sloop-of-war, 171. 

Alexander, Emperor, traits of, 320. 

Alexis, Grand Duke, in Boston, 371. 

Allen, A. S., innkeeper, 392. 

Allen, Rev. James, old stone resi- 
dence, 363. 

Allen, Jeremiah, 261 ; residence, 363. 

Allen Street, 339, 370. 

Allen, Wm. H., 197 ; W. H., 390. 

Allotment of lands, 14. 

Allston, Washington, 38 ; studio, 276 ; 
picture of Belshazzar, 276 ; sketch 
and anecdotes of, 276, 277 ; death, 
276 ; picture of Elijah, 367. 

Almsliouse, Old, 56 ; site and descrip- 
tion of, 299 ; erected, 299 ; removed, 
300 ; management of, 300 ; occupied 
by wounded, 300, 352 ; at West 
End, 375 ; description of, 376. 



442 



INDEX. 



Amazone, French ship, 437. 

Amblard, James, residence, 145. 

American Academy of Arts and 
Sciences, 37, 38, 39. 

American Amphitheatre, 378. 

American Coffee House, 41, 108. 

American Congregational Association, 
363. 

American House, 68, 70. 

America, ship, 180, 437. 

America, seventy-four, built, 180. 

American Works, location and descrip- 
tion of, 427, 428, 429. 

Ames, Fisher, 82 ; funeral, 353, 403. 

Ames, Joseph, 141. 

Ames Manufacturing Company, 58. 

Ames, Richard, shot, 326. 

Amherst, General Jeffrey, 240, 310 ; 
in Boston, 326. 

Amory, Jonathan, residence, 171. 

Amory, Rufus G., 390. 

Amory, Thomas, builds Club House, 
corner Park and Beacon Streets, 
352. 

Amory, Thomas C, 196. 

Anabaptists, 15. 

Ancient Arch, Lynn Street, 199, 200. 

Ancient and Honorable Artillery, 83 ; 
first commander of, 88 ; Governor 
Dummer, Captain of, 102 ; history 
of, 137, 138 ; rendezvous, 138 ; 
armory, 138, 157 ; at Governor Shir- 
ley's fimeral, 267, 315, 331. 

Andover, Mass., 26, 60. 

Andover Theological Seminary, 55. 

Andre, John, execution of, 100. 

Andrew, John A., office, 83 ; statue of, 
345. 

Andrews, Benj., 250. 

Andrews, Ebenezer T., 253. 

Andrews, John, 307. 

Andros, Lady Anne, burial-place of, 
35 ; buried, 228 ; tomb of, 229 ; fu- 
neral, 390. 

Andros, Sir Edmund, 15, 31, 35, 40, 148 ; 
takes possession of Old South, 228 ; 
house, 228 ; deposed, 285 ; reputed 
residence of, 228, 390, 391. 

Annapolis, Naval Museum at, 106. 

Anne, Queen, 33, 64. 



Anne Street. See North Street, 127, 

153. 
Annual Register, British, 431. 
Anthology CluH, 37, 124 ; headquar- 
ters, 268 ; William Tudor, 304. 
Antinornians, sect of, 63. 
Antiquarian Society, 237. 
Appleton, General, 356. 
Appleton, Samuel, 32. 
Appollonio, Mr., 298. 
Apthorp, Charles, 32, 386. 
Apthorp, Charles W., 358. 
Apthorp, Madam, house, 121. 
Arbuthnot, Admiral, 221. 
Arched passage-ways, 121 ; peculiar 

tenure of, 255. 
Arch Street, 39. 
Area of Boston, 8. 
Argus, brig, 181, 197. 
Armstrong, Captain Samuel, 221. 
Armstrong, John, Jr., 66. 
Armstrong, Jonathan, Postmaster of 

Boston, 92. 
Armstrong, S. T., 298; residence and 

bookstore, 338, 371. 
Ashburton Place, 50 ; named, 1 40, 362 ; 

formerly Somerset Court, 363. 
Ashburton treaty, 45. 
Asia, British frigate, 217. 
Asp, schooner, 221. 
Aston, Thomas, 386. 
Asylum for Indigent Boys, 209. 
Athenaeum Block, 280. 
Athenajum, Boston, 37, 38, 39 ; All- 

ston's pictures in, 276, 277, 280, 317 ; 

statues in, 344, 345. 
Atkinson Street. See Congress. 
Atkinson, Tlieodore, 273. 
Atlantic Avenue, 8, 115. 
Auchmuty's Lane. See Essex Street. 
Auchmuty, Robert, senior, 402. 
Auchmuty, Robert, younger, residence 

and sketch of, 402. 
Auchmuty, Sir Samuel, 402. 
Austin, Charles, killed, 114. 
Austin, Joseph, 168. 
Aurora, privateer, 171. 
Avon Street, News Letter printed near, 

82 ; projected by, 365 ; residents of, 

392. 



INDEX. 



443 



B. 

Back Bay, improvement, 8, 333. 
Back Street, 7, 153, 219. See Salem. 
Baiiibridge, William, 100, 186 ; action 

with the Java, 190, 191, 194, 355. 
Bainbridge, sloop-of-war, 185. 
Balch, Natlianiel, 314, 341 ; shop, 394. 
Baldwin, Loamnii, 38, 152 ; Engineer 

of Dry Dock, Charlestown, 185 ; En- 
gineer of Mill Dam, 333. 
Baldwin Place, 151 ; Second Baptist 

Chnrch in, 226, 416. 
Baldwin, Rev. Thomas, buried, 296. 
Ballard, innkeeper, 107. 
Ballard, John, 294. 
Ballon, Rev. Hosea, 64. 
Bancroft, George, 166 ; residence, 385. 
Banks, Commodore, 116. 
Banks, Nathaniel P., 341. 
Banner, Peter, architect of Park Street 

Church, 301. 
Bannister's Lane. See Winter Street. 
Baptist Bethel, 416. 
Barber, Nathaniel, 269. 
Barbour, Major, 357. 
Bardin, Edward, innkeeper, 428. 
Baring, Alexander, in Boston, 140. 
Barker, James, innkeeper, 105. 
Barker, Josiah, 185, 193. 
Barlow, Joel, 193. 
Barnard, Benjamin, %Q. 
Barnstable, 44. 
Barre, Colonel Isaac, portrait, 140, 

269, 407. 
Barrell, Joseph, estate of, 254 ; pioneer 

in Northwest Coast trade, 254 ; 

sketch of, 389 ; store, 389. 
Barret, Samuel, 433. 
Barrett, George, 292. 
Barrett, Mrs. George, 40 ; debut in 

Boston, 318. 
Barrett, George L., 2,56, 318. 
Barricade, The, 8, 114 ; description of, 

115, 284. 
Barrister's Hall built, 317. 
Barry, Commodore John, 182. 
Barry, Mr., 292. 
Bartol, Rev. C. A., 374. 
Barton, Mr., 273. 



Barton's Point, 24 ; ropewalks at, 273, 
369 ; works to be assaulted, 359 ; 
copper-works and intrenchments at, 
369. 

Barton Street, 375. 

Bass, Henry, residence of, 283, 406. 

Bates, Joshua, notice of, 324. 

Bath Street, 269. 

Batterymarch Street, 106 ; old water 
front, 110 ; shipyards on, 112 ; filled 
in, 288. 

Batterymarch, The, 286. 

Battery Street (Alley), 176. 

Battery Wharf, 116,' 168, 177. 

Battle of Lexington, relics of, in State 
House, 347. 

Baudoin. See Bowdoin. 

Baylies, Hon. W., 39. 

Beach Street, 7, 404 ; great fire in, 
416 ; Neck begins at, 418. 

Beach Street Market, 404. 

Beacon Hill, 3, 6, 7, 10, 17, 47, 52, 54 ; 
material used to fill Mill Pond, 152 ; 
called Gentry Hill, 299 ; guns cap- 
tured on, 327 ; British works on, 
328 ; camp of the Light Horse, 329 ; 
ropewalks on, 329 ; monument on, 
345, 352 ; summit of, 349 ; to be 
assaulted, 359, 365. 

Beacon Street, 4, 37, 53, 56; Alms- 
house in, 299 ; town property on 
sold, 300 ; high bluft'at foot of, 325 ; 
British works on, 328 ; named, 333 ; 
aspect of, in 1775, 333 ; residents of, 
333, 360 ; considered out of town, 
338 ; terminus of, in 1722, 352. 

Beacon, The, 17 ; description and his- 
tory of, 349, 352. 

Bean, Mary, keeps the Admiral Ver- 
non, 112. 

Beaver, tea ship, 282. 

Bedford Place, 390. 

Bedford Street, 102, 230 ; called Pond 
Lane, 381 ; Blind Lane a part of, 
381, 390. 

Beecher, Henry Ward, 147. 

Beecher, Laban S., 194. 

Beecher, Lyman, 147. 

Beecher's (Lyman) Church, site of, 
147. 



444 



INDEX. 



Beer, William, 206, 

Beer Lane, 155. 

Belcher, Andrew, residence of, 101 ; 
warehouse, 102, 

Belcher, Governor Jonathan, 40, 67 ; 
residence of, 102 ; portrait of, 347 ; 
gives land for Hollis Street Church, 
414, 

Belcher (and Armstrong), 338, 

Belcher's Lane. See Purchase Street, 
281. 

Belknap's Alley (Brattle Street), 71, 

Belknap, Jeremy, 239, 263 ; buried, 
296 ; residence of, 381. 

Belknap Street, 329 ; ropewalk on, 
352 ; named, 370. 

Bell Alley, 162. See Prince Street. 

Bellamy, Samuel, 49. 

Belle Poule, frigate, 139. 

Bellingham, Governor Richard, resi- 
dence of, 51, 53, 54, 56, 58, 91 ; 
tomb of, 296. 

Bellomont, Earl of, 77 ; house of, 391. 

Bennet, David. See Spencer Pliipps. 

Bennet Street, 153, 213. 

Bent, Ann, shop of, 391. 

Bentley, Joshua, QQ>. 

Bentley, Samuel, 184. 

Bentley, Rev. William, anecdote of, 
187, 188, 

Berkeley, George (Bishop), 72, 

Berkeley Street, 385, 

Bernard, Governor Francis, admits 
British troops to Faneuil Hall, 89, 
236 ; reception, 241 ; proclaims last 
crowned head in colony, 241 ; coun- 
try residence, 242 ; effects stolen, 
242, 247, 303 ; town residence, 307, 
313, 348, 352 ; account of Liberty 
Tree, 398, 399, 

Berry Street, See Channing. 

Berry Street Academy, 262. 

Berry, Grace, 205, 207. 

Berthier, Alexander, in Boston, 433. 

Bethel Church, site of, 168. 

Bethune's Corner, 390. 

Black, Rev, William, 172, 

Black Horse Lane, See Prince Street. 

Black Horse Tavern, 219. 

Blackstone, Sir William, 4, 47. 



Blackstone, William, his settlement, 

2, 3 ; house, 3, 10 ; orchard, 3 ; 

claim to the Peninsula, 4 ; marries, 

dies, 5 ; lot, 28 ; Common purchased 

from, 305 ; reserved six acres, 334. 
Blackstone's Point, 3, 
Blackstone's Spring, 3, 4, 
Blackstone Square, 6, 
Blackstone Street, 6, 7, 68, 127 ; built 

in . channel of Mill Creek, 132 ; 

named, 152. 
Blagden, Rev, G, W., settled in Salem 

Street Church, 220 ; resigns pastor- 
ate of Old South, 220. 
Blake (and Alden), 130. 
Blake, W. R., 291. 
Bland, Mr., 74, 
Bible and Heart, 234, 
Bigelow, Colonel, 269. 
Billings, Hammatt, 38. 
Birthplace of Franklin, 251 ; burnt, 

252, 
Biscaccianti, Eliza, 291, 
Bishop's Alley, 253, See Hawley 

Street, 
Bishop, Madam Anna, 368, 
Bishop, Nathaniel, innkeeper, 248, 

253, 
Bishop-Stoke Street, 52. 
Blessing of the Bay, first ship built in 

vicinity of Boston, 178, 
Blew Anchor, 121, 122. 
Blind Lane, See Bedford Street. 
Bloody Monday, 114. 
Blossom Street built, 376. 
Blott's Lane. See Winter Street. 
Blowers, Sampson Salter, office, 402. 
Blue Anchor Tavern, location of, 121. 
Blue Ball, The, 146 ; description of, 

147, 162. 
Blue Bell and Indian Qaeen, site and 

sketch of, 248 ; another in Brom- 

fi eld's Lane, 248, 253, 275. 
Boarded Alley, or Board Alley, 155, 

253 ; theatre in, 261. See Hawley 

Street. 
Boardman, Rev. Mr., 172. 
Bolter, Thomas, 282. 
Bolton, Dr., British surgeon, 108. 
Bonaparte, Jerome, anecdote of, 139. 



INDEX. 



445 



Bookseller's Row, 338. 

Book of Possessions, 19, 88. 

Boot, Kirk, 196 ; mansion of, 371. 

Booth, Junius Brutus, 40, 41, 394; 
manager of Tremont Theatre, 292. 

Borland's Wharf, 127. 

Boston, a village, 2. 

Boston Bay, 2. 

Boston Chronicle, 107. 

Boston, England, 6. 

Boston Evening Post, office of, 234. 

Boston, frigate, built, 181, 195 ; his- 
tory of, 196, 197 ; Old Boston, 
frigate, 221. 

Boston Gazette, 391. 

Boston Jail, 65 (Old Prison), 76, 77, 
78 ; New Jail, 78 ; burnt, 78 ; 
County, 78 ; Debtor's, 78 ; keys of 
Old Prison, 78 ; Leverett Street, 
78 ; description of, 374 ; removed to 
Charles Street, 375. 

Boston Library, incorporated and 
located, 255. 

Boston Light Dragoons escort Lafay- 
ette, 356. 

Boston Light Infantry, 190, 262. 

Boston Massacre, Knox's relation of, 
85, 89 ; burial of victims, 297 ; no 
monument to, 298. 

Boston Pier (Long Wliarf), 114. 

Boston Port Bill, 68. 

Boston Regiment, The, 21, 65, 210 ; at 
Governor Sliirley's funeral, 267 ; 
detachment guard tea ships, 281 ; 
receives Lafayette, 355, 398. 

Boston Stone, 143 ; history of, 144, 145. 

Boston Theatre, 254 ; opened, 256 ; 
Edmund Kean's first appearance at, 

257 ; second appearance, and riot, 

258 ; Mrs. Rowson, 258 ; Macready, 

259 ; John Howard Paine, 259 ; La- 
fayette at, 259, 364 ; architect and 
description of, 259, 260 ; cast on 
opening niglit, 260. 

Boston and Worcester Railroad, Com- 
pany purchases depot grounds in 
South Cove, 411 ; first equipment 
of, 411. 

Botta, 348. 

Bougainville visits Boston, 341. 



Bourbonnais (French regiment), 435. 

Bourgogne, Due de, French ship, 437. 

Bourne, Garrett, his lot, 404. 

Boutineau, James, residence of, 253. 

Bowditch, Nathaniel, 39 ; statue of, 
344 ; residence of, 384. 

Bowditch, Nathaniel Ingersoll, 384. 

Bowdoin Block, 253. 

Bowdoiu College, James Bowdoin a 
patron, 253. 

Bowdoin, Governor James, 39, 57, 
124, 233, 248 ; first President of 
Massachusetts Bank, 303, 337, 349 ; 
residence of, 361 ; sketch of, 361, 
362, 387 ; widow of, 106. 

Bowdoin, James, Jr., residence of, 
253. 

Bowdoin Square, 369 ; changes in, 
370 ; trees in, 409. 

Bowdoin Square Church, site of, 371. 

Bowdoin Street, named, 352 ; called 
Middlecott, 352. 

Bowdoin Street Church, 147. 

Bowen, Mr., 41. 

Bowers, John, 52. 

Bowling Green, 369. See Bowdoin 
Square. 

Bownd, James, residence of, 223. 

Boyd, General John P., residence of, 
168 ; commands Fort Independence, 
280. 

Boyden, Simeon, innkeeper, 248. 

Boylston's Alley, 121. 

Boylston Hall, Museum in, 42 ; vari- 
ous occupants of, 403, 404. 

Boylston Market, 130, 354, 398 ; his- 
tory of, 403. 

Boylston Place, Boston Library in, 254. 

Boylston Street, 305 ; called J'rog 
Lane, 319 ; Duck Factory in, 322 ; 
British works in, 328. 

Boylston, Thomas, 288. 

Boylston, Ward Nicholas, 288, 403. 

Boylston, Dr. Zal)diel, introduces in- 
oculation, 103, 403. 

Boyne, British frigate, 217. 

Brackett, Antliony, innkeeper, 61. 

Brackett, Josluia, 61. 

Brackett, Richard, 234. 

Braddock, General Edward, 62. 



446 



INDEX. 



Bradstreet, Governor, portraits of, 346, 
347. 

Braintree, 29. 

Brandywine, frigate, named, 382. 

Brattle Square, a place d'armes, 121, 
126 ; headquarters for stages, 126. 

Brattle Street, 42 ; opened to Court, 
71, 72, 74 ; barracks in, 121, 127 ; 
market in, 130. 

Brattle Street Church, 49, 68 ; parson- 
age, 76 ; ruins of, 122 ; history of, 
122, 123, 124, 147, 234; Lafayette 
attends, 355 ; Washington attends, 
387, 416. 

Brattle, Thomas, 31. 

Bravo, French ship, 437. 

Bray's Wharf, 129. 

Bi'asier Iini, 141. 

Brazen Head, 146, 272. 

Brazer's Building, 91, 92. 

Breed's Hill, 24, 116. 

Brenton, Captain William, Collector 
of Boston, 210. 

Brewer, Gardner, 147. 

Brewer, James, 2S2. 

Brickyards on the Neck, 422. 

Bridewell, site of, 299 ; at West Bos- 
ton, 376. 

Bridge, Thomas W., 35. 

Bridge Lane (Richmond Street), 155. 

Bridge Street, built, 376. 

Bridges, Cambridge, 24 ; Charles Riv- 
er, 24, 180 ; West Boston, 24 ; Do- 
ver Street, 24 ; Craigie's, 24 ; Lech- 
mere's Point, 25 ; Western Avenue, 
25, 332, 333; South Boston, 25; 
Boston South Bridge, 24 ; Canal, 24. 

Bridgham's Wliarf, 127. 

Bridgman, Thomas, 205, 207. 

Brigham, Peter B., 71. 

Brighton Street, called Copper, 369. 

Brimmer, Martin, anecdote of, 368. 

Brimstone Corner, 301. 

Brissot, De, in Boston, 341. 

Britannia, steamsliip, 290. 

British Coffee House, 60 ; location of, 
107 ; James Otis assaulted in, 108 ; 
theatricals in, 260. 

British Light Horse, stables and camp, 
329. 



British Society, 31. 

British Stamps (Stamp Act), 80 ; speci- 
mens of, 81 ; ])urnt, 90 ; riots, 110. 

Broad Street, 109 ; built, 110 ; riot in, 
111. 

Brock, General, 410. 

Bronitield, Edward, residence of, 294, 
362. 

Bromfield House, 248. See Indian 
Queen tavern, 294. 

Bromfield, John, 38. 

Bromfield's Lane, 41. 'See Street. 

Bromfield Street, 10, 227 ; named, 294. 

Bromfield Street Church, 416. 

Brooker, William, Postmaster of Bos- 
ton, 79 ; publishes Boston Gazette, 
79, 104. 

Brookline, 14, 418. 

Brooks, Edward, 147. 

Brooks, Governor John, sword of, 40, 
43 ; at Bunker Hill, 86, 100, 355, 
361 ; anecdote of, 367. 

Brooks, Peter C, 321. 

Brougliam, John, 74. 

Brougham, Mrs., 74. 

Brougham, Lord, 53. 

Br^n, Charity, 206. 

Brown, Deacon, 425. 

Brown, Elislia, prevents occupation of 
Factory House by troops, 303, 

Brown, Gawen, 234. 

Brown, Mr., house and barns of, 427 ; 
British outpost, 427 ; destroyed, 
427. 

Brown, William, 49. 

Bruce, Captain James, 282. 

Bryant, Gridley J. F., 58. See United 
States Bank, 94. 

Bryant, W. C, 290. 

Buckingham, Joseph T., 403. 

Buckminster, Joseph S., 38, 123, 124. 

Bucks of America, 40. 

Building stone, curious statement 
about, 422. ' 

Bulfinch, Charles, 39 ; Franklin Street 
improvement, 75, 213, 248, 254 
architect of Boston Tlieatre, 259 
of Federal Street Churcli, 264, 311 
of new State House, 343 ; Beacon 
Hill Monument, 350 ; sketch of. 



INDEX. 



447 



369, 370 ; designs new South Church, 
380 ; Hollis Street Church, 415. 

Bulfinch Street. See Valley Acre, 
370. 

Bulfinch Street Church, 416. 

Bulfinch, Thomas, residence of, 369. 

Bull's Head, the home of G. R. T. 
Hewes, 269. 

Bull Pain, 46. 

Bull Tavern, site of, 380. 

Burastead Place, residence of Adino 
Paddock, 294, 295. 

Bimch of Grapes Tavern, location of, 
105, 107 ; Washington at, 432. 

Bunker Hill, Battle of, 60, 65, 69, 70 ; 
Knox at, 85, 87 ; General Dearborn 
at, 106 ; troops embark for, 113, 
177 ; reminiscences of, 202, 216 ; 
General Howe's address to his 
troops, 245 ; burial-place of soldiers, 

323 ; Lafayette's visit to, 355. 
Bunker Hill Monument, Webster's 

oration at, 45 ; brass guns in, 72, 
112, 120, 278, 315; architect of, 
312 ; corner-stone laid, 346, 392. 

Bunker Hill Monument Association, 
352. 

Bunker Hill Quarry discovered, 312. 

Burgoyne, General John, 125, 127, 
203, 204, 207 ; his regiment occupies 
Old South, 231 ; anecdotes of, 231, 
232 ; at council, 243, 245 ; author of 
plays, 260, 310 ; capitulation of, 

324 ; occupies Bowdoin's house, 362, 
426, 427. 

Burnet, Gilbert (Bishop), 237. 
Burnet, William, 31 ; residence of, 

65, 105, 236 ; born, 237 ; died, 237, 

246, 247 ; portrait of, 346. 
Burns, Anthony, remanded to slavery, 

113. 
Burr, Aaron, 296. 
Burritt, Elihu, 293. 
Bury Street. See Channing, 263. 
Bussey, Benjamin, residence of, 254, 

416. 
Bute, Lord, hung in effigy, 399. 
Butler, Peter, warehouse and wharf, 

112. 
Butler's Row, 112, 129. 



Butler, Pierce, 121. 

Buttrick, John, 345. 

Buttolph Street, 370. 

Byles, Mather, 29, 64, 67 ; anecdotes 
'of, 85, 210 ; birthplace, 218, 219, 
238 ; residence and sketch of, 412 ; 
death, 413 ; anecdotes of, 413, 414. 

Byles, Mather, Jr., 216. 

Byng, Admiral, effigy of, 150. 

Byron, Lord, 193. 



Cabot, George, residence of, 295 ; 
• sketch of, 295, 296. 

Cabot, Edward C, 38. 

Calico printing in Boston, 322. 

Cambridge, 86. 

Cambridge Bay (Back Bay), 414. 

Cambridge Bridge, 325. 

Cambridge Commencement, 16. 

Cambridge Street, extent of, 369. 

Campbell, John, Postmaster of Bos- 
ton, publishes News Letter, 82, 104, 

Campbell, Nicholas, 282. 

Campbell, William, innkeeper, 176. 

Cami), Fredericksburg, QQ. 

Caner, Rev. Henry, 29, 32, 35, 267. 

Canton, Mass., Revere's copper works 
at, 120. 

Canton Street, British works near, 
426. 

Cape Cod, 49, 203. 

Cape Cod Row, 316. 

Capen, Nahum, Postmaster of Bos- 
ton, 385. 

Carleton, Sir Guy, 406. 

Carroll, Bishop, 256. 

Carr, Sir Robert, insolent reply to 
Governor Leverett, 174. 

Carter, Master James, 57, 75 ; resi- 
dence of, 76. 

Carter, Mrs., boarding-house of, 353. 

Cartwright, Colonel George, 174. 

Carver, Governor John, sword of, 40. 

Carver Street, British works near, 
328. 

Cass, Lewis, 139, 185, 192. 

Castle, The, 24, 115 ; troops removed 
to, 121, 170 ; French prisoners at, 



448 



INDEX. 



197 ; view of Boston from, 241 ; tea 
consignees at, 334 ; surgeon, 363 ; 
stamps sent to, 399 ; fortified, 424. 

Cathedral (new), 420, 421. 

Cathedral Buildings, site of Cathedral 
of Holy Cross, 255. 

Caucus, North End, rendezvous and 
origin of the name, 176. 

Causeway (Mill Pond), 1, 150 ; origin 
of, 151. 

Causeway Street, 7, 150. 

Cazneau, Mr., residence of, 402. 

Centinel Hill, 370. 

Central House, 121. 

Central Wharf, arch on. 111, 115. ' 

Centre Street, 37, 153, 154. 

Centre Writing School, 57, 75 ; anec- 
dote of, 304. 

Centry Hill, 56. See Beacon Hill. 

Centry Street named, 299. See Park 
Street. 

Chambers Street, 370. 

Champney, John, 60. 

Champcenetz, Marquis, 433. 

Change Avenue {see Pillory), 93 ; 
United States Custom House on 
corner of, 105. 

Channing Street, John H. Payne's 
residence in, 262 ; named, 263. 

Clianning, Rev. W. E., 263, 264. 

Chantrey, Sir F., statue of Washing- 
ton, 345. 

Chapin, Rev. E. H., 64. 

Chapman, Captain, 229. 

Chapman Hall, 65. 

Chapman, Jonathan, 140. 

Chapman Place, 65. 

Chappotin, Leon, public-house of, 384 ; 
entertains Jerome Bonaparte, 384. 

Chardon, Peter, residence of, 371. 

Chardon Street, school-house in, 371. 

Charles I., 10, 11, 50, 55. 

Charles II., 33, 34, 51, 53, 83, 174. 

Charles River, 2, 3, 17 ; commanded 
by North Battery, 177, 203. 

Charles Street, 4 ; ropewalks near, 
324 ; opened, 324, 325 ; sea-wall 
built, 325, 333, 370 ; trees removed 
from, 409. 

Charleston, S. C, 103. 



Charlestown, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 ; slaves 
shipped to, 13 ; Ferry, 24, 25 ; 
Portsmouth stage, 26, 57, 65 ; at- 
tack on, 117. 

Charlestown Bridge, 5, 7. 

Charlestown Company, 5, 10. 

Charlestown Ferry, 5, 125. 

Charlestown Navy Yard, 182, 183, 
186, 194, 195, 322, 327 ; Lafayette's 
visit to, 355. 

Charlestown Neck, 25, 181 ; retreat 
over, 203, 207, 243. 

Charter Street, named, 209 ; residents 
of, 211. 

Chase, Major-General, 355. 

Chase, Thomas, 282. 

Chastellux, Marquis, 19, 24, 61, 85, 
362, 435. 

Chatham Street, 112. 

Chauncey, Commodore Isaac, 186. 

Chauncy Place named, 381, 382. 

Chauncy Street, First Church removed 
to, 84. 

Checkley, Rev. Samuel, 380. 

Cheever, Ezekiel, 57. 

Chelsea, 14, 24. 

Cherub, frigate, 171. 

Cheverus, Bishop, 255 ; anecdote of, 
256. 

Chicopee, 58. 

Child, Lydia M., 167, 168. 

Choate, Rufus, office, 82 ; anecdotes 
of, 83, 219 ; portrait of, 141. 

Christ Church, 163, 200 ; history and 
description of, 213, 214, 215, 216; 
legends of, 216, 217 ; second Epis- 
copal church, 213 ; steeple blown 
down, 213; chimes, 214, 215, 386, 
414. 

Church, Colonel Benjamin, sword of, 
40, 48. 

Cliurch, Dr. Benjamin, 120, 149 ; on 
the Boston clergy, 161, 229 ; treason 
discovered, 243 : residence of, 243, 
269, 392, 414. 

Church Green named, 380. 

Church pews, introduction of, 416. 

Church Square, 84. 

Circidating Library, First, 106. 

Citoyen, French ship, 437. 



INDEX. 



449 



City Excliange, 99. 

City liall, 7 ; liistory of, 58, 59 ; Old 
State House used as, 89. 

City Market, 130. 

City Tavern, 121. 

Civic Feast held in Boston, 110. 

Claghorn, Colonel George, 1S2, 183. 

Clai)board Street, iiee Joy Street. 

Cla].]), William W., 403. 

Clark, Rev. Jonas, 214. 

Clark, Captain Tinio, 284. 

Clark's shipyard, site of, 174, 178. 

Clark's Square. See North Square. 

Clark Street, 19. 

Clark's Wharf, 170. See Hancock's. 

Clark, William, residence of, 163. 

Clarke, Benjamin, 283. 

Clarke, John, 55, 363. 

Clarke, Richard, store and residence 
of, 334. Samuel, 59. 

Clay, Henry, 193 ; at Tremont House, 
290. 

Clifton Place, American works near, 
428. 

Clinton, Sir H., 90, 103 ; arrived in 
Boston, 125, 127, 207; at cJbuncil 
of war, 243 ; relieves Howe, 244, 
245, 285, 310 ; occupies Hancock's 
House, 362. 

Clinton Street, Triangular Warehouse 
in, 131. 

Club House, Park Street, builder, 
352 ; Lafayette resides in, 352 ; 
Christopher Gore, Samuel Dexter, 
George Ticknor, and Malbone live in, 
352, 353 ; a boarding-house, 353 ; 
becomes Club House, 354. 

Coaches, public and private, first used, 
25 ; numljer of, in 1798, 25, 26. 

Cobb, General David, 100, 361, 364. 

Cobuni, John, residence of, 113. 

Cochituate Lake, 23. 

Cockburn, Admiral, 321. 

Cockerel Church. See Second Church. 

Codman's Buildings, 70. 

Codmau, John, 196, 389. 

Codman's Wharf, 129. 

Coffin, Admiral Sir Isaac, 154, 309 ; 
birthplace and sketch of, 405 ; en- 
dows Coflfin School, 406. 



Coffin, General John, 154 ; birthi^lace, 
405. 

Coffin, Captain Hezekiah, 282. 

Coffin, Lieutenant-Colonel, 116. 

Coffin, Nathaniel, 405. 

Coffin, Sir Thomas Aston, 154, 406. 

Coffin School, 406. 

Coffin, William, innkeeper, 105. 

Coffin, William, 386, 406. 

Coggan, John, first shopkeeper, 88. 

Colbron, William, field of, 305. 

Colburn, Jeremiah, 240. 

Cole Lane (Portland Street), 126, 145. 

Cole's (Samuel) Inn, first in Boston 
108, 109, 141. 

Cole, Master Samuel, 75. 

Collier, Sir George, 191. 

Collingwood, Admiral, 116. 

Colman, Rev. Benjamin, 123, 138. 

Colonnade Row, built and named, 316 ; 
residents of, 316, 317 ; called Fayette 
Place, 316, 317. 

Colson, Adam, 282 ; residence of, 306. 

Columbian Centinel, office of, 100, 101. 

Columbia River, named for, 254. 

Comey's Wharf, 182. 

Commercial Cofiee House, 105. — See 
Bunch of Grapes, — location of, 287. 

Commercial Street built, 128, 153, 
198. 

Common, The, 3, 4, 10, 17 ; collector's 
boat burnt on, 170, 214, 289 ; extent 
of, 296 ; Granary erected on, 262, 
265, 299 ; Park Street built on, 299 ; 
Almshouse, Workhouse, and Bride- 
well on, 299 ; spinning exhibitions on, 
302 ; history of, 305 ; only three trees 
on, 305 ; the malls planted, 305, 306 ; 
more territory purchased for, 306 ; 
disfigured by camps, 306 ; fences on, 
306, 307 ; called Gentry Field and 
Training Field, 307 ; West Street 
entrance, 313 ; Mason Street the 
east boundary, 314 ; hay-scales and 
gun-house on, 322 ; guns parked on, 
in 1812, 322 ; Boylston Street Mall, 
323 ; ropewalks on, 324 ; the lower 
part a marsh, 325 ; topography of, 
325 ; troops embarked for Lexington, 
326 ; English forces on, 326 ; mili- 
CC 



450 



INDEX. 



tary execution on, 326 ; a permanent 
camp, 327 ; position of British 
works on, 327, 328 ; an intrenched 
camp, 328 ; Powder House on, 329 ; 
ponds, 329 ; executions on, 331, 
332, 360 ; duel on, 332 ; British 
hospital and guard-house on, 332 ; 
Beacon Street Mall, 333 ; review by 
Lafayette, 355 ; introduction of Co- 
chituate water, 357 ; Stamp Act 
repeal, 358, 359 ; review of events 
on, 358 ; music on, 359 ; grazing 
and executions on, discontinued, 360 ; 
Washington reviews Continental 
troops on, 432. 

Common Burying-Ground opened, 323; 
uses and traditions of, 323, 324 ; 
British soldiers buried in, 323 ; 
British fortification near, 328. 

Common Street described, 412, 416. 

Commonwealth Avenue, 124, 145 ; 
statue in, 344. 

Conant, Colonel, 214. 

Conduit Street, 127. 

Concert Hall, 70 ; military court in, 
71 ; early use by Masons, 71 ; office 
of Customs Commissioners, 71 ; 
grand ball to Admiral D'Estaing, 
71, 430. 

Concord, N. H., ancient Rumford, 87. 

Congress Hall. See Julien. 

Congress House, location of, 281. 

Congress Street, 37, 234, 264. State 
Sti'eet so called, 89 ; United States 
Bank in, 96 ; Exchange Coffee House 
in, 99 ; origin of name, lOi ; made 
land, 109 ; Quaker church and burial- 
ground, 267, 268 ; the Anthology 
Club, 268 ; part called Atkinson 
Street and Green Lane, 271. 

Congress Square, Custom House in, 
106. 

Conscription Riot, 1863, 223, 224. 

Constellation, frigate, 171, 181. 

Constitution, frigate, 139 ; built, 180 ; 
history and exploits, 180 to 196 ; 
keel laid, 181 ; first named officially, 
181 ; designers and mechanics of, 
182 ; figure-head, 183 ; battery, 183 ; 
launch, 183, 184 ; description of, 



185 ; rebuilt, 185 ; first cruise, 185, 
186 ; conmiander, 186 ; escape from 
British fleet, 187 ; anecdotes of, 188, 
189 ; named Old Ironsides, 189 ; rel- 
ics of, 192 ; figure-head affair, 193, 
194, 195, 201 ; her sails made in 
the Granary, 322. 

Constitution Wharf, 191. 

Conway, General, 140. 

Cooke's Court, 65. 

Cooke, Elisha, house of, 65. 

Cooledge, Thomas, 282. 

Cooley, Azariah, innkeeper, 429. 

Coolidge, Joseph, 196, 283. 

Cooper, J. Fenimore, 165 ; historical 
error, 181. 

Cooper, Rev. Samuel, 123, 124. 

Cooper, Samuel, 9. 

Cooper, Thomas A., 191. 

Cooper, Rev. William, 123. 

Cooper, William, residence of, 72. 

Copley, John S., 4, 52, 67, 73, 122, 
140, 165 ; residence of, 334 ; goes 
abroad, 35 ; dies, 335 ; sale of es- 
tate, 335, 336 ; personal appearance, 
336'; an engraver, 336 ; opinions of 
his works, 336. 

Copley, Richard, 371. 

Copp, Joanna, 205. 

Copp, William, 198, 205. 

Copper Street. See Brighton. 

Copp's Hill, 6, 7, 10, 17, 22, 24, 114 ; 
used to fill Mill Pond, 152, 158, 
176 ; shipyards at, 179 ; description 
of, 198 ; British works on, 199, 202, 
204 ; bombardment from, 207 ; 
place of recreation, 208, 244, 399. 

Copp's Hill Burying-Ground, 157, 159 ; 
Mather's tom'b, ^162, 163, 199 ; de- 
scription of, 204, 205 ; inscriptions, 
205, 206. 

Coram, Captain Thomas, 30. 

Corn Court, United States Court 
House in, 106 ; named, 141. 

Cornish, Catherine, 16. 

Cornish, William, 16. 

Corn Hill. See Fort Hill. 

Cornhill (Old), 22, 55, 72 ; origin of 
name, 76 ; first clock placed in, 85 ; 
extent of, 88, 89; Post-Office in, 



INDEX. 



451 



104 ; To\vn Pump in, IIS ; Blue 
Anchor in, 121 ; emblematic signs 
in, 14(3 ; booksellers in, 338 ; named 
Washington Street, 420. 

Cornhill (New), 42, 75 ; built and 
called Market Street, 7(5, 104. 

Cornhill Court, 84. 

Cornhill Square, 84. 

Corn Market 141. 

Cornwallis, Lord, capitulation of, 436. 

Getting Uriali, 46, 248 ; buried, 296 ; 
builds Mill-Dam, 333 ; residence,36o, 
366 ; builds New Cornhill, 76 ; Broad 
Street, 110 ; India Street, 111. 

Cotton Hill, 6, 8, 9, 34, 47 ; Andros's 
house near, 228, 391. 

Cotton, John, 7, 11, 35, 47, 48 ; house, 
50, 51 ; estate, 52, 56, 63, 91, 101, 
412. 

Cotton, manufacture of, begun, 322. 

Couronne, French ship, 437. 

Court Avenue, 84. 

Court dress, described, 245, 246. 

Court House, 44 ; new, 57 ; old Coun- 
ty, description of, 59 ; present, 77 ; 
old brick Court House, 78 ; County, 
78 ; Municipal, 78 ; present, built, 
79, 82 ; old State House used as, 
90 ; present, 94 ; architect of, 312. 

Court Street, 42, 47, 68, 71, 75 ; Prison 
Lane, 77 ; Queen Street, 77, 79 ; 
headquarters newspaper press, 81, 
82 ; cannon concealed in, 315. 

Coventry Street, 52. 

Cow Lane. See High Street. 

Crabtree, Mr., builds Causeway, 151. 

Cradock, George, 42, 56. 

Cradock, Mathew, 47. 

Crafts, Eben, 301. 

Crafts, Colonel Thomas, 221. 

Crane, John, Tea Party, 282 ; injured 
on tea -sliip, 283 ; j)lants trees in 
Paddock's Mall, 294, 295 ; residence 
and anecdote of, 412 ; destroys 
Bro^\^l's house, 427. 

CraAvford, Thomas, 38. 

Crawford, William H., 197. 

Creek Lane, 127, 144 ; named, 145. 

Crescent Place, 373. 

Crocker, Hannah M., 161, 166, 215. 



Crockett, David, 45. 

Cromwell, Oliver, 13, 51, 61, 83. 

Cromwell's Head, 61, 62. 

Crooked Lane, 94. See Wilson's Lane. 

Cross Street, 127 ; destroyed, 154, 158. 

Cross Tavern, 154. 

Crosswell, Rev. Andrew, 64. 

Crown Coffee House, location, 112. 

Crovm Point. See Ticonderoga. 

Cumberland, frigate, 185. 

Cummings, G., innkeejier, 398. 

Gushing, Judge, residence of, 337. 

Gushing, Tliomas (Lieutenant-Govern- 
or), 57, 136, 180 ; birthplace, 248 ; 
dies, 248 ; burial-place, 248. 

Gushman, Charlotte, 394. 

Custom House, Royal, 42, 76, 94, 156, 
157 ; First United States, 103, 105, 
106 ; figures on, 106 ; in Custom 
House Street, etc. , 106 ; ships built 
on site of, 112 ; present, columns of, 
94, 112, 131 ; State, 142. 

Cutler, Timothy, D. D., first rector of 
Christ Church, residence of, 215. 

Gyane, sloop-of-war, 185. 

Gyane, frigate, 186 ; captured, 191 ; 
flag of, 193. 



D. 



Dacres, Admiral James R., anecdotes 
of, 99, 100, 189. 

Daille, Rev. Pierre, 64. 

Dale, Captain Richard, 182. 

Dalrymple, Colonel, 347. 

Dalton, Peter Roe, Cashier United 
States Bank, 96. 

Dana, Edmund T., 38. 

Dana, Richard, 400 ; residence of, 402, 

Darracott, George, 205. 

Darley, Mrs., dehut of, 318. 

Dartmouth, tea ship, 282. 

Dassett's Alley, 79. 

Davenport, Rev. Addington, first rec- 
tor of Trinity, 386, 387. 

Davenport, James, innkeeper, 168. 

Davenport, Jean Margaret, debut in 
Boston, 378. 

Davenport, John, 35 ; house, 55, 56. 



452 



INDEX. 



Davies Lane, 352, 
Davis, Caleb, 389. 
Davis, Admiral Charles H. , birthplace 

and sketch of, 364. 
Davis, Daniel, residence and sketch of, 

364. 
Davis, Deacon, 243. 
Davis, Isaac, 345. 
Davis, Isaac P., 273. 
Davis, John, report of codfish ery, 

348. 
Davis, Judge John, 100, 370. 
Davis, Major, 138. 
Dawes, Major Thomas, architect of 

Brattle Street Church, 122, 269 ; 

birthplace, 281 ; fireward, 295, 398. 
Day, Captain James, innkeeper, 286. 
Dean, John Ward, 139. 
Dean, Julia, first appearance in Boston, 

378. 
Deane, American frigate, 221. 
Deane, Silas, 251, 310. 
Dearborn, General Henry, 100 ; Collec- 
tor of Boston, 105, 106 ; residence 

of, 106 ; married, 253, 364, 410. 
Dearborn, H. A. S., 106, 298. 
De Beaumetz, M., 141. 
Decatur, Stephen, 186, 187, 188, 197. 
Dedham Street, 419 ; British works 

near, 426. 
De Genlis, Madame, 141, 142. 
De Joinville, Prince, in Boston, 139, 

140. 
Delano, Mrs., boarding-house of, 362. 
Delight, privateer, 171. 
Derby, George H., anecdote of, 291. 
Derby, Richard, 269. 
Derne Street, 351. 
Descriptions by early travellers, 16, 17, 

18, 19. 
Deshon, Moses, 135. 
D'Estaing, Coimt, in Boston, 71, 91, 

103 ; reception in Faneuil Hall, 138, 

232, 339 ; anecdote of, 341, 356. 
Deux Ponts, Count Christian, 434 ; 

Count William, 434. 
Devonshire Street, 98, 254. 
Dewey, Captain, 194. 
Dexter, Aaron, 269. 
Dexter, Mrs., 120, 307. 



Dexter, Samuel, 114 ; residence and 
sketch of, 353, 354, 370, 414. 

Dibdin, Dr., 336. 

Dickens, Charles, at Tremont House 
290, 293. 

Dickinson, John, Liberty Song of, 252. 

Dickinson, Thomas, 196. 

Dickson, J. A., 256, 257, 318. 

Dike built on the Neck, 420. 

Distilleries in 1722, 18 ; oldest in Bos- 
ton, 406 ; Avery's, 406 ; Haskins's, 
406 ; number in Boston in 1794, 
406 ; Henry Hill, 406. 

Distill-House Square, 151 ; named, 371. 

Ditson, Oliver, and Company, 223. 

Dock Square. 56, 126 ; covered by 
tides, 127, 130 ; old market in, 134 ; 
riot of 1863, 142. 

Dolbier, Edward, 283, 410. 

Done, Joseph, 49, 

Doolittle's Tavern, 154. 

Dorchester annexed, 23, 160. 

Dorchester Artillery, 316. 

Dorchester Heights, 208, 359. 

Dorchester Neck, 23, 425. 

Dorr Rebellion, 106. 

Dorsett's Alley, 79. 

Doty, Colonel, innkeeper, 392, 

Dover Street, shipyard near, 419. 

Dow, Lorenzo, 173. 

Downes, Commodore John, residence 
of, 111, 159. 

Dowse, Thomas, library of, 40. 

Doyle, William M. S., 41. 

Drake, Samuel G., 170, 365. 

Dramatic Museum, site of, 404. 

Draper's Alley, 121. 

Draper, John, residence of, 121. 

Dress of the Puritans, 11. 

Drowne, Deacon Shem, 135, 236. 

Dry Dock, Charlestown, opened, 139, 
185. 

Dryden, John, 15, 63. 

Dubuque, residence of, 270. 

Duck Manufactory, location and his- 
tory of, 322. 

Du Coudray, M., 86, 328. 

Dudley, Governor Joseph, 31. 

Dudley, Governor Thomas, 225. 

Duff, Mr., 257. 



INDEX. 



453 



Di;ke of Argyle, 272. 

Duke of Bolton, 3S4. 

Duniaresq, Philip, residence of, 372, 
386. 

Dumas, Count Matliieu, 434. 

Duninier, Jeremiah, residence of, 102 ; 
birthplace, 103. 

Dummer, Governor William, 40 ; resi- 
dence of, 102, 103. 

Dunbar, battle of, prisoners from, 13, 

Dunlap, William, 335. 

Dunster, Henry, estate of, 84. 

Dunton, John, 122. 

Duplessis, 147. 

Dupont, Admiral, 364. 

Du Portail, General, 285. 

Durivage, F. A., 104. 

Duvivier, P. S. B., makes die for 
Washington Medal, 432. 

Dyar, Mary, hung, 330. 

E. 

Eagle Tlieatre, history of, 378. 
Earl's Coffee House, 70, 154. 
East Boston, 14, 23. 
East Boston Company, 23. 
East Cambridge Bridge, 7. 
Eastern Avenue, 168. 
Eastern Military District, 383. 
Eastern Stage House, location of, 154. 
Eastham, 49. 

Eaton, Andierst, innkeeper, 430. 
EajTes, Joseph, 282. 
Eckley, Rev. Joseph, buried, 296. 
Edes, Benjamin (and Gill), prints Bos- 
ton Gazette and Country Journal, 

80 ; office, 81 ; Tea Party coimcil, 

81 ; prints for Provincial Congress, 
81 ; house, 121. 

Edes, Thomas, Governor Hutchinson 

concealed in his house, 166. 
Edict of Nantes, 54. 
Edinboro' Street, 407. 
Edwards, Jonathan, 72. 
Edwards, Rev. Justin, 220. 
Eleanor, tea ship, 282. 
Election Sermon (Artillery), 138. 
Elgin, Eari of, in Boston,'l40. 
Eliot, Andrew, buried, 207. 



Eliot, John, 39, 155; residence, 174; 
buried, 207. 

Eliot, Samuel, 56, 196. 

Eliot, Samuel A., 56. 

Eliot School, 65 ; history of, 218 ; 
present school dedicated, 219 ; re- 
bellion of pupils, 219. 

Eliot Street, 416. 

Elliott, General, 262. 

Elliott, Commodore Jesse D., 186 ; 
affair of figure-head, 194, 195. 

Ellis, Joshua, 165, 207. 

Ellis, Rowland, 165. 

Elm, The Great, 10, 305, 329 ; witch- 
craft executions, 330 ; age and sketch 
of, 330, 331, 334. 

Elm neighborhood, 396. 

Elm Street, 102 ; headquarters of 
stages, 126 ; widened, 145. See 
Wing's Lane. 

Embargo of 1812, 116. 

Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 385. 

Emerson, William, 38, 385. 

Emmons, Commodore G. F., 180, 185. 

Endicott, Governor John, 5, 11, 40 ; 
house, 47, 48, 53, 56, 58 ; portraits 
of, 346, 347. 

Endicott Street, 151. 

England, Church of. 33, 34. 

English High, and Latin Schools, 390. 

English, Thomas, residence of, 390. 

Enterprise, schooner, 171. 

Episcopalians, 4, 15. 

Er\-ing, Colonel John, 295 ; residence, 
267. 

Erving, Colonel John, Jr., 263 ; resi- 
dence, and funeral of Governor 
Shiriey from, 267. 

Essex Coffee House (Salem), 201. 

Essex, frigate, 171. 

Essex Junior, 111. 

Essex Street, 53 ; Boston Library in, 
2.55, 401, 404; residents of, 407 
410. 

Eustis Street, Roxbury, Shirley man- 
sion in, 239. 

Eustis's Wliarf, 132. 

Everett, Edward, 6, 45, 50, 123, 124 ; 
School, 219 ; residence, 219, 250. 

Everett, Colonel, 364. 



454 



INDEX. 



Ewer, Charles, projects South Cove 
and Avon Street improvements, 365, 
411. 

Exchange (present), 83 ; in Old State 
House, 89 ; United States Bank on 
site of, 95, 101, 104 ; in Congress | 
Street, 269. I 

Exchange Coffee House, 91 ; history 
and description of, 98, 99 ; burnt, 
99, 100 ; banquet to Bainbridge, 
190 ; Willard works on, 311 ; con- 
flagration of, 311 ; dinner to Lafay- 1 
ette, 355, 403. I 

Exchange Street, 56, 96 ; description, 1 
101. 

Extmguisher, Engine House, 402. 



Fairbanks, Richard, first Postmaster 
of Boston, 104. 

Familists, 51. 

Faneuil, Andrew, 54, 64, 101 ; ware- 
house, 108, 112 ; corner, 114, 115, 
163. 

Faneuil, Benjamin, 30, 112 ; store, 
129, 386 ; funeral of, 390. 

Faneuil Hall Market, 76, 127. Se,e 
Quincy Market, 130. 

Faneuil Hall, 30, 39, 44, 54, 55; 
Lovell's address in, 57 ; used as 
Town House, 59 ; Trumbull exhibits 
his picture in, 73 ; Knox's, portrait, 
86 ; British troops, 89 ; Eagle from 
United States Bank, 95, 102 ; site, 
127 ; a market, 130 ; history and 
description of, 133 to 141 ; portraits 
in, 140, 141 ; called Cradle of Lib- 
erty, 133 ; burnt, 135 ; enlarged, 
135 ; grasshopper on, 135, 193 ; Tea 
Party meeting, 229 ; anecdote of, 
249 ; theatre in, 260 ; Dalrym - 
pie's regiment quartered in, 303 ; 
Phillips's first antislavery speech 
in, 337 ; lottery authorized to re- 
build, 343 ; toast by Lafayette, 355 ; 
anti-Mexican war-meetings, 379, 
403. 

Faneuil, Peter, 30 : estate, 54, 55, 57 ; 
warehouse, 112, 129 ; builds Faneuil 



Hall, 134, 135 ; death, 136 ; por- 
trait, 141, 236, 253 ; the Wood- 
bridge-Phillips duel, 113, 386 ; at- 
tends Trinity Church, 387. 

Faneuil, Susannah M., 253. 

Farragut, Admiral D. G., 364. 

Farwell, J. E., 267. 

Faust's statue, sign of, 252. 

Fayette Place. See Colonnade Row. 

Fayette Street. See Soutli Allen. 

Federal Band, 262. See J. Howard 
Payne. 

Federal Street, 25 ; Theatre, 256 ; fish 
taken in, 264. 

Federal Street Church, 89 ; site and 
descrijition of, 263 ; anecdote of the 
vane, 263 ; Federal Convention held 
in, 263, 264 ; rebuilt, 264. 

Felt, J. B., 423. 

Fenno, John, keeper of the Granary, 
299. 

Ferries, 24 ; Cliarlestown, 202 ; inci- 
dents of, 203. 

Fifth British regiment, 113, 116 ; at 
Bunker Hill, 203. 

Fifty-second British regiment, 177. 

Fifty-ninth British regiment at Bunker 
Hill, 203 ; posted x)n the Neck, 
425. 

Five Points, 153. 

Fillmore, Millard, in Boston, 371. 

Finn, Henry J., 257 ; died, 258, 292. 

Fire Department, origin of, 19, 20; 
reforms in, 56. 

Fire engine, first, 19 ; first made in 
Boston, 20. 

Fires of 1654, 1676, 1678, 19 ; of 1825, 
23 ; of 1787, 416. 

First Baptist Church, 150 ; history 
and location, 222 ; organized, 227, 
363. 

First Battalion Marines, British, 177. 

First book printed in Boston, 82. 

First buildings, character of, 9. 

First Churchl, 7, 35, 50, 55, 56 ; second 
location, 84 ; Old Brick, 84, 85 ; first 
site, 91, 102 ; buriit, 113 ; John 
Hull member of, 211, 363 ; estate, 
382, 385 ; removal, 385 ; relics of 
the Old Brick, 3£5. 



INDEX. 



455 



First clock set up, 85, 

First Directory published in Boston, 

no. 

First glass-works, location and sketch 
of, 408 ; destroyed, 408. 

First Methodist Church, 172, 173 ; 
accident in, 173. 

First newspaper printed in Boston, 
16. 

First stone block, 71. 

First Smiday school in New England, 
374. 

First Universalist Church, 172, 173. 

First war vessel built in Boston, 179. 

Fish market, location of, 127. 

Fish Street (North), 26, 153 ; de- 
scription of, 158. 

Fitche, Colonel, 307. 

Flagg Alley (Change Avenue), 105. 

Flags used by Americans. 431. 

Flagstaff Hiil, Old, British works on. 
328. 

Flat Conduit, 127. 

Fleet, Thomas, printing-office of, 234. 

Fleet Street, 161 ; gardens of Gov- 
ernor Hutchinson on, 167 ; named, 
168, 220. 

Fleming, John, 107. See Mein. 

Flounder Lane 281. 

Flucker, Thomas, residence of, 271 ; 
Lucy, 271. 

Fuller Sarah Margaret (Countess d'Os- 
soli), residence and school of, 312 ; 
shipwreck and death of, 312, 392. 

Fulton Street, 128. 

Forbes, R. B., 161. 

Fore Street, The, 7, 152, 219. 

Forest Hills, General Warren en- 
toml)ed at, 311. 

Fort Du Quesne, 125. 

Fort Field. See Fort Hill. 

Fort George, 168. 

Fort Hill, 6, 7, 17, 115 ; embargo flag 
on, 116, 176 ; shipyards at, 179 ; 
illumination on, 209 ; great fire of, 
1760, 272 ; Revolutionary fort lev- 
elled, 272 ; fortified, 284 ; garrison 
of, 285 ; works strengthened, 285 ; 
guns removed, 285 ; rejoicings on, 
286 ; description of, 287, 288 ; lev- 



elled, 288 ; Stamp Act troubles, 399, 
409 ; hill fortified, 424. 

Fort Hill Block, 280. 

Fort Independence, 280. See Castle. 

Fort Lee (N. Y.), incident of, 374. 

Fort Snelling named, 221. 

Fort Washington, incident of, 373. 

Forty-ninth British regiment, part of, 
in Lexington expedition, 304. 

Forty-seventh British regiment, 177, 
229. 

Forty-third British regiment, 177. 

Foster. Jolm, prints first book in Bos- 
ton, 82. 

Foster Street, 200, 211. See Clark. 

Foster, William, innkeeper, 105. 

Foster, William, residence of, 306, 
313, 404. 

Foster's Wharf. See Wlieehvright's. 

Foundling Hospital, Loudon, Eng- 
land, 30. 

Fourth Baptist Church, site of, 267. 

Fourth British regiment, part of, in 
Lexington expedition, 304. 
I Fourteenth British regiment, quarters 
' of, 271 ; on the Common, 326. 

Fowle, William B., 145. 

FoAvle, Zachariah, printing-office of, 
223. 

Fox, British ship, 220. 

Foxcroft, Thomas, 55. 

Fox Hill levelled, 325, 328. 

Frankland, Sir Charles H., 30, 97; 
residence, 162 ; Lady Frankland, 
163, 165 ; description of house, 163, 
164, 165, 236 ; narrow escape of, 421. 

Frankland, Lady, narrow escape of, 421. 

Franklin Avenue (Dorsett's Alley), 
79 ; ])art of Brattle Street, 79. 

Franklin, Benjamin, 57 ; anecdotes of, 
58 ; ai)prentice in Queen Street, 80 ; 
publishes Courant, 80 ; his old press, 
80, 145 ; birthplace, 146 ; original 
portraits, 147, 162 ; obtains Hutch- 
inson's letters, 166 ; baptized, 229, 
249 ; anecdote of, 251 ; bom, 252 ; 
Mrs. (Reed), 80. 

Franklin, James, prints Boston Ga- 
zette, 79 ; N. E. Courant, 79 ; forbid- 
den to print Courant, 80, 103, 104. 



456 



INDEX. 



Franklin, Josias, his sign and sliop, 
146, 252. 

Franklin Place, 255. 

Franklin School, Charles Sprague at- 
tends, 417. 

Franklin Statue, 57, 58, 337. 

Franklin Street, 9, 39, 75, 227 ; a bog, 
254 ; reclamation of, 254. 

Fraser, Colonel Simon, his regiment on 
Boston Connnon, 326 ; death and 
burial at Stillwater, 327. 

Frederick, Francis, hanged, 424. 

Freeman, James, 39. 

Freeman Place Chapel, built on site of 
Governor Phillips's house, 362. 

Freemason's Arms, 150. See Green 
Dragon Tavern. 

Freemasons' first Lodge in Boston, 
150. 

Freemason's Hall (Tremont Street) 
burnt, 318. 

French and Indian war, 20. 

French army, entry into Boston of, 433 
to 437 ; composition of, 433 ; uni- 
form and band, 434 ; embarkation, 
437. 

French Artillery, uniform of, de- 
scribed, 436. 

French Huguenot Church, 63 ; de- 
scription of, 64 ; occupied by Cath- 
olics, 256. 

Freneau, Philip, lines of, on General 
Gage, 427. 

Free Writing-School, 75. 

Friends of Liberty, resort of, 70. 

Frizell's Square. See North Square. 

Frog Lane. See Boylston Street. 

Frog Pond, 329. 

Front Street. See Harrison Avenue. 

Frothingham, Nathaniel, 282. 

Frothingham, Mr., 313, 322. 

Frothingham, Richard, Jr., 116. 

Fuller, Sarah Margaret, 312. 



G. 



Gage, General Thomas, 53, 57, 90 ; 
lands at Long Wharf, 115 ; chariot, 
116, 123, 124, 125, 127, 137, 149, 



168, 203, 208, 216, 225, 236; in 
Province House, 242, 243 ; married, 
243 ; resemblance to Samuel Adams, 
243 ; proclamation ridiculed, 244, 
247, 272, 293, 326, 340 ; portrait of, 
348, 369, 426, 427. 

Gallery of Fine Arts, 130. 

Gallows, position of, 423 ; anecdote . 
about, 423 ; executions, 424. 

Gamba, Count, 193. 

Gammell, T., 283. 

Garden Court Street, 162, 164. 

Garden Street, 370. 

Gardiner, John, 261. 

Gardner, Gideon, innkeeper, 428. 

Gardner, John S. J., 38, 386. 

Gardner, Eliza G., 340. 

Garrison, William Lloyd, 379. 

Gas first used in Boston, 22. 

Gates, General Horatio, m, 73, 103, 
144, 145; anecdote of, 232, 310; 
commands in Boston, 383 ; anecdote 
of, 383, 429. 

Gay Alley (Brattle Street), 71. 

Gay, John, 1. 

Gay, Timothy, 206. 

Gee, Joshua, shipyard of, 179 ; resi- 
dence, 202, 204. 

Geographical divisions, 10, 

George I., 102. 

George II., 90 ; portrait, 140, 167. 

George III., 58; accession last pro- 
claimed in Boston, 90, 167 ; outlaws 
Hancock and Adams, 308, 309. 

George Street. See Hancock. 

George Tavern, Governor Burnet's re- 
ception at, 238. 

George Tavern (St. George), American 
advanced post at, 428 ; burnt, 428 ; 
history of, 428, 429, 430 ; anecdotes 
of, 430. 

Gerry, Elbridge, 70, 201. 

Gerrish, Thomas, 282. 

Geyer, Frederic, residence of, 389. 

Geyer, Nancy W., 390. 

Gibben's shipyard, location of, 419. 

Gibbs, Major Caleb (of Boston), 182. 

Gill, John (Edes and), imprisoned by 
Howe, 81. See Edes. 

Gilman, Arthur, 58. 



INDEX. 



457 



Glasgow, British frigate, 207, 208. 

Glass manufacture begun in Massa- 
cliusetts, 408. 

Godilard, Benjamin, 196. 

Godtlard, Nathaniel, 196. 

Golfe, General William, 55. 

Gooch, Captain, brave deed of, 373. 

Goodrich, Henry, 286. 

Goodwin, Benjamin, yard of, 180, 201, 
204. 

Goodwin's Wharf, 202. 

Gordon, General Hugh McKay, 154. 

Gore, Governor Christopher, 39, 45, 
72; defends Selfridge, 114, 190, 
269 ; residence descri])ed, 279 ; 
sketch of, 279 ; personal appear- 
ance, 280 ; resides in Park Street, 
352, 389. 

Gore Hall named, 280. 

Gore, Samuel, 72, 282, 314, 408. 

Gorges, Robert, 4. 

Gorham, Mr., residence of, 275. 

Gouch Street named, 373 ; noted for, 
374. 

Gould and Lincoln, bookstore of, 402. 

Gould, John, 215. 

Government of Boston, 14. 

Government House. See Province 
House, 246. 

Governor's Alley, 64. 

Governor's Dock, location of, 114. 

Governor's Foot Guards. See Cadets. 

Governor's House. See Province 
House. 

Grafton, Duke of, 140. 

Grand Lodge occupy Old State House, 
91. 

Granary, Constitution's sails made in, 
182 ; the site of, 298 ; description 
and uses of, 299 ; removed, 299. 

Granary Burying-Ground, 54, 76, 204 ; 
Governor Cushing biiried in, 248, 
289 ; history of, 296, 297, 298 ; noted 
persons buried in, 296, 297 ; Frank- 
lin cenotaph, 298 ; called South 
Burying-Ground, 298 ; Faneuiltomb, 
296 ; victims of Boston Massacre 
buried in, 297 ; filled with bodies, 
298 ; tombs erected in, 298 ; en- 
larged, 298 ; legends of, 298 ; stone 
20 



wall built, 298, 307, 323 ; Benjamin 
Woodbridge buried in, 332 ; Gov- 
ernor Eustis buried in, 366. 

Grant, Moses, 206, 282, 314. 

Grant, U. S., 10.5 ; .Tames, 243. 

Graupner's Hall, 394. 

Graves, Admiral Thomas, residence of, 
272. 

Graves, Daniel, 206. 

Gray, Edward, 273. 

Gray, Harrison, 44, 245, 273 ; pro- 
scribed, 274 ; goes to London, 274. 

Gray, John, 273. 

Gray, Captain Robert, discoverer of 
Columbia River. 

Gray, Thomas, 38. 

Grav, William, 201, 324, 382. 

Gray's Wliarf, 201. 

Great Mall, The, 305, 306 ; first trees 
planted in, 306 ; description of, 306 ; 
trees cut down by British, 306 ; in 
cidents of, 310, 360. 

Greeley, Horace, 312. 

Green, Bartholomew, prints News Let- 
ter at, 82 ; residence, 98 ; printing- 
office, 392. 

Green Dragon Tavern, 64, 148, 149, 
150. 

Green, Joseph, 33, GQ ; residence, 67 ; 
lampoons the Masons, 96 ; residence, 
67, 414. 

Green, Jeremiah, 285. 

Green, John (and Russell) office, 76, 81. 

Green Lane (Salem Street), 153, 210. 

Green Lane. See Congress Street. 

Green, Samuel, innkeeper, 176. 

Green Street, 151; residents of, 372; 
church, 373. 

Green Store Battery, 425. 

Greene, Albert G, 300. 

Greene, Gardiner, 47 ; residence, 52, 
53 ; President of the United States 
Bank, 94 ; Copley's agent, 336, 363, 
389. 

Greene, General Nathaniel, C6, 144, 
282, 310 ; to assault Boston, 359 ; 
commands in Boston, 382, 405. 

Greenleafs Gardens. See Washington 
Gardens. 

Greenleaf, Dr. John, 124. 



458 



INDEX. 



Greenleaf, Stephen, 304 ; residence, 

313, 352. 
Greenleaf, William, reads Declaration 

of Independence, 91. 
Greenough, Henry, 247. 
Greenough, Richard S., 38, 57, 58, 226. 
Green's Barracks, 271. 
Greenwood, Ethan A., 42. 
Greenwood, Rev. F. W. P., 30, 
Greuze, 147. 
Gridley, Jeremy, 71, 314 ; residence, 

402. 
Gridley, General Richard, at Bunker 

Hill, 208, 426 ; lays out works on 

Neck, 427. 
Griffin, Rev. Edward D., 301. 
Griffin's Wharf, 410. See Liverpool. 
Griggs, John, recollections of Boston 

Neck, 426. 
Grove Street, 370 ; Medical College in, 

377. 
Growth and progress of Boston, 23. 
Gruchy, Captain, 200, 215. 
Guerriere, British frigate, 99, 188, 189, 

190 ; flag of, 193. 
Guiccioli, Countess, 193. 
Gun-house, on Copp's Hill, 204 ; in 

Cooi)er Street, 223 ; attack on, 224 ; 

on Fort Hill, 288. 
Gun-house in West Street, 314 ; re- 
moval of guns from, 314 ; history of 

the guns Hancock and Adams, 315 ; 

one on tlie Common, 322 ; removed 

to Pleasant Street, 322. 
Gmi-house (Thacher Street), materials 

of, 375. 
Gunpowder Plot. See Pope Day, 149. 



H. 

Hackett, James H., first appearance 

in Boston, 368. 
Hagen, P. von, 303. 
Haley, Madam, 52. 
Half-Square Court, 98 ; Custom House 

in, 106. 
Halifax, Lord, 78. 
Halifax, N. S., 32; patriots carried to, 

65. 



Hall, Captain James, 282. 

Hallowell, Benjamin, residence of, 
148 ; assaulted, 170, 273, 285. 

Hallowell, Benjamin Carew, 148. 

Hallowell's shipyard, 275, 287. 

Hamilton, Alexander, 296 ; statue of, 
344. 

Hamilton, Colonel, 355. 

Hamilton College, 381. 

Hamilton Place, 39 ; Manufactory 
House in, 301 ; built, 304. 

Hamilton Street, 286. 

Hammock, John, 215, 

Hancock, Ebenezer, Q6 ; office and 
residence, 144, 145. 

Hancock, frigate, 220. 

Hancock House, 141. 

Hancock, Governor John, 24, 40, 42, 
43, 44, 49 ; house occupied by Per- 
cy, 53, 57, 69, 71 ; portrait by 
Trumbull, 73, 91, 110 ; gives a beU 
to Brattle Street Church, 122, 123, 
124, 125 ; store, 129, 130 ; portrait, 
140, 141 ; builds Hancock's Row, 
144 ; Pope Day, 150 ; warehouses, 
170, 176, 208, 214 ; address on Mas- 
sacre, 228, 233, 248 ; action to sup- 
press theatres, 261 ; gives bell and 
vane to Federal Street Chui'ch, 263 ; 
presides over Federal Convention, 
264 ; widow, 264 ; commands Ca- 
dets, 293 ; commission revoked, 
294 ; fireward, 295 ; tomb of, 296 ; 
funeral, 297, 308 ; anecdote of, 309 ; 
house, 338 ; extent of estate, 338, 
339 ; description of mansion, 339, 
340 ; pillaged, 340 ; quarters of 
General Clinton, 340 ; incidents of, 
340, 341, 342 ; anecdotes of, 341 ; dies 
intestate, 341 ; sketch of, 341, 342 ; 
personal appearance, 343 ; 350 ; in- 
troduces music on Common, 359, 
393 ; dinner to Rochambeau's offi- 
cers, 437. 

Hancock, John (son of Ebenezer), 
349. 

Hancock, Lydia, residence of, 76 ; gives 
her mansion to Governor John, 338, 
342. 

Hancock, Madam, anecdote of, 341. 



INDEX. 



459 



Hancock mansion, history of, 338 to 

MS ; ert'orts to preserve it, 341, 342 ; 

demolished, 342 ; Stamp Act repeal, 

359, 362. 
Hancock's Row built, 144. 
Hancock School, 155. 
Hancock Street, named, 352 ; called 

George Street, 352. 
Hancock, Thomas, 76, 130, 163 ; his 

wharf, 170 ; fvmeral, 208 ; builds 

house on Beacon Street, 338, 342, 

351. 
Hancock's Wliarf, description of, 170 ; 

events at, 170, 171 ; Lafayette lands 

at, 356. 
Handel, 32. 
Handel and Haydn Society, sketch of, 

394 ; occupy Boylston Hall, 403. 
Hanover Avenue, 172. 
Hanover Church. See Beecher's 

Chi^rch. 
Hanover, Massachusetts, anchors of 

frigate Constitution made at, 182. 
Hanover Square, 396. 
Hanover Street, 10, 19, 25, 68, 70, 75, 

130, 143, 144 ; widened, 145 ; Frank- 
lin's birthplace, 146 ; widened, 147 ; 

bridged, 152 ; a neck, 152, 161 ; 

Governor Hutchinson's gardens, 167, 

172, 173. 
Hanover Street Church (Methodist), 

415. 
Harper, Mr., 256. 
Harris, Isaac, 182 ; hoists flag over 

Constitution, 185 ; saves Old South, 

233. 
Harris, Lord George, 203. 
Harris, Master, residence of, 161. 
Harris, Rev. ThaddeusM., anecdote of, 

413. 
Harris Street, 175. 

Harrison Avenue, origin and descrip- 
tion of, 404, 405. 
Harrison, John, first rope-maker, 273 ; 

ropewalks, 273. 
Harrison, Joseph, Collector in 1770, 

97 ; assaulted, 168 ; Richard Ack- 

lom, 170. 
Harrison, Peter, 29. 
Harrison, General W. H., 45, 



Harris's Folly, 281. 

Hart, Zeplianiah, 180. 

Hartford Convention, 44, 295. 

Hartly, Mr., Ife2, 197. 

Hartt^ Edward, 180. 

Hartt, Edmund, 180 ; residence, 181, 
196 ; buried, 206. 

Hartt's Naval Yard, 181, 183, 195, 196, 
197. 

Hartt, Ralph, 180. 

Harvard College, 33, 84 ; Rumford 
Professorship, 87, 103, 160 ; Gore 
Hall named, 280. 

Harvard Place, 270. 

Haskell, S., innkeeper, 398. 

Hatch, Israel, iimkeeper, 96 ; adver- 
tisement, 399. 

Hatch, Mrs., 307. 

Hatch's Tavern, location of, 313. 

Hatters' Square, 145. 

Haverhill Street, 378. 

Hawkins's Shipyard, 175. 

Hawkins Street, 371. 

Hawkins, Thomas, 175; shipyard, 178. 

Hawthorne, Nathaniel, description of 
Old Prison, 77 ; invocation to Town 
Pump, 84 ; Scarlet Letter, 92 ; Le- 
gends of Province House, 235. 

Hay, Theodocia, 206. 

Haymarket, The, 313, 322. 

Haymarket Square, 151. 

Haymarket Theatre, site of, 313, 317 ; 
opening and description of, 318. 

Hayne, Robert Young, 45. 

Hays, Catherine, 293. 

Hay-scales. See Haj-market. 

Hayward, Dr. Lemuel, residence of, 
392. 

Hayward, John, Postmaster of Boston, 
104. 

Havward Place named, 393. 

Healey, G. P. A., 140. 

Heart and Crown, 146, 234. 

Heath, General William, 40, 144, 145, 
231, 267 ; commands in Boston, 383 ; 
headcpiarters, 383. 

Henchman, Captain Daniel, 200 ; ac- 
credited with planting the Great Elm, 
331. 

Henchman, Colonel Daniel, residence 



460 



INDEX. 



of, 76 ; builds first paper-mill, 76 ; 
store, 85, 137. 

Henchman's Lane, 199, 200. 

Hercule, French ship, 437. 

Hermione, French frigate, 356. 

Hewes, George R. T., residence of, 269 ; 
Tea Party, 282, 283. 

Hewes, Shubael, butcher-shop of, 270. 

Hibbins, Anne, 53 ; executed, 330. 

Hibbins, William, 53. 

Hichborn, Benjamin, residence and 
sketch of, 250 ; commands Cadets, 
294. 

Higginson, Francis, portrait of, 346. 

Higginson, Stephen, 196. 

Higginson, Stephen, Jr., 196. 

High Street, 37, 46, 272 ; called Cow 
Lane, 273 ; affray in, 274 ; described, 
280. 

Hill, Aaron, Postmaster, 269. 

Hill, Thomas, 406. 

Hillier's Lane (Brattle Street), 71. 

Hillsborough, Lord, 249, 398. 

Hills Wharf, 127. 

Hinckley, David, residence of, 362 ; tra- 
gic incident connected with, 363. 

Historic Genealogical Society, 364 ; 
origin and sketch of, 365 ; building 
and library, 365. 

Historical Society, Massachusetts, 39, 
40, 141 ; relics of Hutchinson in, 
167 ; of Province House, 247 ; in 
Franklin Street, 255 ; Speaker's Desk 
and Winslow's chair, 347. 

Hodgkinson, Mr., 256, 

Hodson, Thomas, 351, 352. 

Holbrook, Abraham, 314. 

Holland's Coffee House, 50. 

Holley, Rev. Horace, 415. 

Hollis Strjeet, British works near, 328, 
411 ; originally called Harvard, 414 ; 
great fire in, 416. 

Hollis Street Church, 102, 103. 

Hollis Street Church, history of, 414, 
415, 416 ; Stamp Act celebration, 
414; burnt, 414 ; removed to Brain- 
tree, 415 ; tablets in, 416 ; fire of 
1787, 416 ; troops quartered in, 416. 

Hollis, Thomas, Hollis Street named 
for, 414. 



Holmes, Francis, innkeeper, 105. 
Holmes, Dr. 0. W., 65, 192. See Hub 

of the Universe. 
Holy Cross Cathedral, site and sketch 

of, 255, 256 ; removal, 256. 
Holyoke, Edward A., 39 ; residence, 

159. 
Holyoke Street. See Tremont. 
Home of Little Wanderers, 222. 
Homer, B. P., residence of, 338. 
Hood, Lord, 310. 
Hood, Thomas, 94. 
Hooper, Rev. William, 374. 
Hooten, John, 283. 
Hopkintou, Sir Charles Frankland's 

estate at, 162. 
Horn Lane. See Bath Street. 
Horse Pond, 329. 
Horticultural Building, 294. 
Horticultural Hall, 42 ; statues on, 344. 
Hospital Life Insurance Company 

founded, 317, 377. 
Hotel Boylston, site of J. Q. Adams's 

residence, 319. 
Hotel Pelham, 313. 
Houchin's Corner, 70. 
House of Correction, site of, 299 ; in 

Leverett Street, 375 ; at South Bos- 
ton, 375. 
House of Industry, 376. 
Hovey and Company, 389. 
How, Edward C, 282. 
Howard, Captain Anthony, 25. 
Howard Athenaeum, 40 ; site, 366. See 

Millerite Tabernacle ; opening, 368 ; 

burnt, 368 ; rebuilt and sketch of, 

368. 
Howard, John, 48. 
Howard, S., 283. 
Howard, Simeon, 374. 
Howard Street, 47 ; (Southack's Court), 

48, 49. 
Howe, Lord George, monument erected 

to, 241. 
Howe, Sir William, 65, 69 ; at Bunker 

Hill, 70, 86, 90 ; arrival in Boston, 

125, 127, 136, 160, 177, 207, 208, 225 ; 

residence, 236 ; at council of Avar, 

243 ; sketch of, 244 ; addi-ess before 

battle of Bunker HHl, 245, 246; 



INDEX. 



461 



quarters of, 271, 373 ; stops destruc- 
tion of trees on Common, 306, 382, 
432. 

Hub of the Universe, Dr. Holmes ori- 
ginates the saying. 344. 

Hubbard, Deacon, 231. 

Hubbard, Thomas, residence, 389. 

Hubbard, Tuthill, Postmaster of Bos- 
ton, 104. 

Hudson, Francis, 202. 

Hudson's Point, 5 ; (Mylne Point), 
24 ; named, 202. 

Hull, 116. 

Hull, General, Lafayette visits, 364. 

Hull, Hannah, 204 ; anecdote of, 
212. 

Hull, Commodore Isaac, at Exchange 
Coffee House, 99 ; anecdotes of, 99, 
100, 139, 185, 186, 188, 189, 190, 
192, 194, 197, 290. 

Hull, John, 51, 52, 204, 211 ; estab- 
lishes mint, 212 ; supposed residence 
of, 296. 

Hull Street, 204 ; named, 211. 

Humphries, General David, 100, 364. 

Humphries, Mrs. General, residence 
of, 364. 

Humphries, Joshua, designs frigate 
Constitution, 182, 192. 

Hunnewell, Jonathan, 283. 

Humiewell, Richard, 283. 

Hunnewell, Richard, Jr., 283. 

Himt, William M., 141. 

Huntington, General, 364. 

Hurd, Mr., assists in planting trees of 
Great Mall, 306. William, 283. 

Hurdley, William, 282. 

Hutchinson, Anne, 51, 62 ; trial and 
banishment of, 63, 226. 

Hutchinson, Edward, residence of, 
171, 200. 

Hutchinson Street. See Pearl Street. 

Hutchinson, Thomas (Elder), 163, 164; 
residence of, 168, 175 ; buried, 207 ; 
gives land for school-house, 219. 

Hutchinson, Governor Thomas, 31, 40, 
63, 90, 102, 122, 125, 158 ; residence 
of, 166 ; sacked, 166 ; description, 
167 ; sails for England, 167 ; house 
built, 168 ; suceeeds Spencer Phips, 



211, 223, 230, 233, 236, 240, 241, 
267, 271, 278, 293, 308, 347, 399. 413. 



lasigi, Mr.. 344. 

Inches, Henderson, 125 ; ropewalks 

of, 329. 
Independent Cadets, march to Rhode 

Island, 250 ; quarters and sketch of, 

293 ; disbanded, 294 ; reorganized, 

294 ; escort Lafayette, 355. 
Independent Chronicle, enterprise of, 

433. 
India Street, 109, 110 ; built. 111. 
India Wharf, 111. 
Indians, Eastern, 8. 
Indian Hill, West Newbury, 247. 
Ingersoll, Joseph, imikeeper, 42, 105, 

122. 
Ingollson, Daniel, 283. 
Insurance Office, first, 107. 
Ipswich, 57. 
Irving, Mr., 170. 
Island of Boston, 152. 



J. 

Jackson, Andrew, 95 ; visits Boston, 
139, 183, 185,192, 193, 194 ; head of, 
195 ; at Tremont House, 290, 373. 

Jackson, Judge Charles, 100. 

Jackson, Dr., residence of, 365. 

Jackson, General Henry, 182 ; anec- 
dote of his regiment, 430. 

Jackson, James, 38, 61. 

Jackson, Hon. Jonathan, 43. 

Jacobs, Mr., 322. 

Jamaica Pond, 23. 

James I., 50. 

James II., 34, 237. 

Jarvis, Leonard, 293. 

Jarvis, Rev. Samuel P., 311. 

Jason, American ship, 220. 

Java, frigate, 190. 

Jefferson, Thomas, 126 ; his embargo, 
279 ; opinion of Samuel Adams, 
308, 319. 

Jeffrey (and Russell) purchase North 
Battery, 177. 



462 



INDEX. 



Jeffrey, Patrick, estate of, 25 ; Scollay's 
Building erected by, 75, 76. 

Jeffrey's Wharf, 177. See North Bat- 
tery. 

Jeffries, Dr. John, recognizes War- 
ren's body, 69 ; buried, 296, 363. 

Jekyll, John, 50. 

Jenks, Rev. William, 57, 219; his 
church and residence, 373. 

Jenkins, Robert, 215. 

Johnson, Lady Arabella, 35. 

Johnson, Edward, 3 ; description of 
Boston, 17. 

Johnson Hall, 59. 

Johnson, Isaac, 10 ; his location, 35, 
52, 59, 23 i. 

Jclinson, Samuel, 193. 

Joliffe's Lane. See Devonshire Street. 

Jones, Inigo, 369. 

Jones, Commodore Jacob, 186, 193. 

Jones, John Coffin, 124 ; residence of, 
148, 253, 389. 

Jones, John Paul, sails from Boston in 
French fleet, 437. 

Jones, Margaret, hung, 320. 

Jones, Mrs., 256. 

Jones, Thomas Kilby, Morton Place 
named for, 253. 

Jonson, Ben, 61. 

Jossleyn, John, 17, 21. 

Joy, Benjamin, 196, 385. 

Joy, Dr. John, 333 ; shop and resi- 
dence, 338. 

Joy Street, 338. 

Joy's Buildings, corner Congress and 
Water, 37, 109 ; Washington Street, 
84. 

Julien Hall, 277. 

Julien House (" Restorator "), site and 
sketch of, 270, 271. 

Julien, Jean Baptiste, residence of, 
270 ; dies, 271 ; widow succeeds 
him, 271. 

Junon, British frigate, 191. 



Kean, Charles, 258. 

Kean, Edmund, first plays in Boston, 



257 ; second visit and riot, 257 ; anec- 
dote of, 258. 

Keayne, Captain Robert, 58 ; house, 
88, 137, 300. 

Keith, Colonel, 383. 

Keith, Lieutenant Robert, 221. 

Kendrick, Captain John, 254. 

Kennedy, Timothy, murdered, 424. 

Kent, Benjamin, 269. 

Kent, Duke of, in Boston, 390. 

Kemble, Thomas, 13, 162. 

Kidd, William, imprisoned in Boston 
Jail, 77 ; piracies, arrest and execu- 
tion, 77, 78. 

Kilby, Christopher, residence of, 272 ; 
Kilby Street named for, 272. 

Kilby Street, 23, 41, 105 ; description 
of, 109 ; Stamp Office in, 110 ; named, 
272 ; filled, 288. 

Kimball, Moses, 42. 

King Philip, 40 ; Philip's War, 5, 83, 
331. 

King, Rufus, 82, 269. 

King, Thomas Starr, sketch of, 415. 

Kingman, Edward, innkeeper, 392. 

King's Arms. See George Tavern. 

King's Chapel, 28, 29 ; architect of, 
29 ; history of, 30 ; description of 
Old Chapel, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35 ; tombs 
under, 36, 46, 56, 61 ; Warren's re- 
mains deposited in, 69, 163 ; Gov- 
ernor Burnet attends, 239 ; Governor 
Shirley buried under, 267 ; over- 
crowded, 385 ; royal gifts to, 386, 
394, 416. 

King's Chapel Burying-Ground, 32, 
35 ; legends of, 36 ; interments 
cease in, 36, 37, 204, 205, 206 ; Gov- 
ernor Wintlirop buried in, 226, 228 ; 
filled with bodies, 298 ; tombs erected 
in, 298, 323. 

King's Head Tavern, site of, 168. 

King Street, 55, 60 ; Andrew Faneuil's 
warehouse, 64 ; changed to State, 
89 ; called Congre s, 89 ; full of 
dwellings, 98 ; lower end in 1708, 
108 ; great tide of 1723, 109 ; Gov- 
ernor Shirley resident in, 239. 

Kinnison, David, 283. 

Kirk, Edward N., 50. 



INDEX. 



463 



Kirk, Tlaomas, 170. 

Kirkland, Jolin T., 38, 100 ; residence, 
3bl. 

Kirkland, Samuel, 381. 

Kiiapj), Josiah, dwelling of, 419. 

Kneeland, Samuel, printing-office of, 
79 ; prints Boston Gazette, 79, 80. 

Kneeland Street occupied by a wharf, 
419. 

Knight, Sarah, 162. 

Knox, General Henry, shop of, 85 ; 
anecdotes of, 85, 86 ; portrait, 141, 
158 ; marries, 271 ; estate at Thomas- 
ton, 272, 281, 315 ; occupies Copley's 
house, 336. 

Kupfer, Charles F., 408. 



L. 



Laboratory, British, on Griffin's 
Wharf, 284 ; American, 322 ; an- 
other, 322. 

Labouchiere visits Boston, 341, 367. 

Lafayette, G. W., resides in Boston, 
278. 

Lafayette Hotel, 398. 

Lafayette, Marquis de, 45 ; anecdote 
of, 97 ; in Boston, 105, 124 ; at 
Faneuil Hall, 138, 139 ; at Boston 
Theatre, 259, 265, 278 ; streets 
named for, 316, 341 ; reception in 
1824, 345, 346 ; in 1825, 346 ; resi- 
dence in 1824, 352, 396 ; fire of 
1787, 416 ; incidents of his recep- 
tion, 354, 355 ; anecdotes of, 355, 
356, 357, 363, 364, 382. 

Lamb, Charles, 128. 

Lambert, Captain, 190. 

Lamb Tavern, site and history of, 
392. 

Lameth, Alexander de, 433. 

La Nymphe, British frigate, 191. 

La Rochelle, 54. 

Lathrop, Rev. John, 160 ; residence, 
168 ; buried, 296. 

Latin School (South), 33, 44, 54, 56, 
57, 72, 75, 136 ; FrankUu goes to, 
146. 

Latin School Street, 56. 



Laud, Archbishop, 50. 

Lauzun, Duke de, cavalry of, descrip- 
tion of, 435 ; incident of his execu- 
tion, 436 ; legion of, 435. 

Lavoisier, 87. 

Lawrence, 121. 

Lawrence, Abbott, 46, 120, 121, 322 ; 
residence, 357. 

Lawrence, Amos, shop of, 120 ; resi- 
dence, 316. 

Lawrence Scientific School, 121. 

Laws, curious old, 12, 15. 

Learned, Colonel Ebenezer, first to en- 
ter Boston after the evacuation, 432. 

Leather Street, 280. 

Le Berceau, frigate, 196, 197. 

Lechmere's Point, 25. 

Lee, American schooner, 220. 

Lee, Arthur, 252. 

Lee, General Charles, 125, 425. 

Lee, Joseph, 282. 

Lee, Thomas, residence of, 173. 

Lee, William, entertains Talleyrand, 
141. 

Le Kain, Mrs., residence of, 275. 

Le Mercier Andre, 64. 

Leonard, Mr., opens National Theatre, 
378. 

Les Deux Anges, 196. 

Levant, frigate, 186 ; captured, 191 ; 
flag of, 193. 

Levasseur, M., 356. 

Leverett, Governor John, 82 ; resi- 
dence, S3, 102, 156, 174 ; portrait 
of, 346. 

Leverett's Lane, 101 ; John F. Wil- 
liams resides in, 264. See Congress 
Street. 

Leverett Street, 151 ; Almshouse re- 
moved to, 300, 370 ; jail in, 374. 

Leverett Street Jail, debtors confined 
in, 375 ; executions in, 375. 

Leverett, Elder Thomas, 101 ; owaied 
site of exchange, 101. 

Lewis, Samuel S., 128. 

Lexington, 44, 53 ; battle of, 137. 

Lexington expedition planned, 242 ; 
thwarted, 243. 

Lev, Lord, in Boston, 109. 

Liberty Hall, 397, 398. 



464 



INDEX. 



Liberty sloop (Hancock's), seizure of, 
170. 

Liberty Square, 109 ; made ground, 
109 ; Stamp Office in, 110 ; named 
for and celebration of Civic Feast in, 
110 ; burnt over, 272. 

Liberty Tree planted, 331 ; arch 
erected on site of, 354 ; Stamp Act 
repeal, 359. 

Liberty Tree, site of, 396 ; planted, 
397 ; cut down, 397 ; effigies hung 
on, 399 ; events under, 399, 400, 
401 ; Liberty stump and pole, 398. 

Liberty Tree Tavern, 398. 

Light Infantry Company, 294. 

Lighthouse (tavern). The, 26. 

Lighting the streets, 22. 

Lincoln, Abraham, 141. 

Lincoln, Earl of, 35. 

Lincoln, Enoch, 388. 

Lincoln, General Benjamin, first 
United States Collector of Boston, 
103, 105 ; expedition to Nantasket, 
116 ; commands troops in Shays's 
Kebellion, 361. 

Lincoln, Governor Levi, 346. 

Lincoln, L^vi, Sr., 388 ; Levi, the 
younger, 388. 

Lincoln, Martha, incident of her de- 
cease, 388. 

Lincolnshire, England, 6. 

Lind, Jenny, 40, 293, 371, 394. 

Lindall Street, 267. 

Lindel's Rov^r, Mrs. Pelham's shop, 372. 

L'Insurgente, frigate, 171. 

Linzee, Captain, sword of, 40, 334. 

Lion Tavern, site and history of, 394. 

Lion Theatre, opening and sketch of, 
394. 

Lisbon, earthquake at, 162, 163. 

Little, Captain George, 196 ; court- 
martialled, 197. 

Little Wild Street, London, 58. 

Little, William, residence of, 168. 

Livingstone, Robert, assists in fitting 
out^ Captain Kidd, 77, 78. 

Livingstone, Robert, 193. 

Liverpool Wharf, 230 ; the Tea Party, 
281 ; barracks and laboratory on, 
284. 



Lloyd, Dr. James, residence of, 363. 

Lloyd, James, residence of, 363 ; en- 
tertains Lafayette, 363. 

Lloyd, Mrs. James, residence of, 
355. 

London Bookstore, 107. 

London Packet, 170. 

London Stone, 144. 

Long Acre. See Tremont Street. 

Long Island, 116. 

Long Island (New York,) search on, 
for Kidd's treasure, 78. 

Long Wharf, incident of, 100, 112 ; 
history of, 114, 115 ; events con- 
nected with, 115, 116 ; embarkation 
of British troops from, 116, 117, 
327 ; first locomotive landed from 
England, 411. 

Lord Ashburton. See Alexander Bar- 
ing. 

Lord, James, Collector of Boston, 
142. 

Loring, James S., 65, 314. 

Loring, Matthew, 283. 

Lothrop, Rev. Samuel K., 76, 123. 

Loudon, Lord, 310. 

Louisburg, 115, 137. 

Louisburg Square, statues in, 344. 

Louis Pliilippe (Due de Chartres), in 
Boston, 100, 101 ; residence of, in 
Boston, 145. 

Louis XVI., 58, 110, 145 ; portrait by 
Stuart, 408. 

Lovell, James, 65 ; Collector of Bos- 
ton, 142 ; residence of, 277, 373. 

Lovell, Master John, 44, 57, 65 ; eulo- 
gy on Peter Faneuil, 136, 245. 

Love Lane. See Tileston Street, 218. 

Love, Susannah, 218. 

Low, John, innkeeper, 287. 

Lowell, Rev. Charles, 316. 

Lowell, Francis Cabot, establishes 
cotton factories, 316 ; city of Lowell 
named for, 316. 

Lowell Institute founded, 316. 

Lowell, Judge John, 316. 

Lowell, John, 32 ; residence of, 316 ; 
called " Boston Rebel," 317, 389. 

Lowell, John, Jr., founds Lowell In- 
stitute, 316. 



INDEX. 



465 



Lucas, Sarah, 206. 

Ludlow, Charles, 186. 

Ludlow, Mr., 15. 

Lvman, Theodore, St., 49, 196, 371, 
'389. 

Lyman, General Theodore, 356. 

Lynch, General, 433. 

Lyndhurst, Lord, 52, 53 ; revisits 
Boston, 336. 

Lynde Street, 370. 

Lynn, 25 ; remains of Quakers re- 
moved to, 268. 

Lynn Street, 198 ; ancient arch in, 
199, 200 ; origin of, 219. 



M. 

Macdonough, Thomas, 186. 

Macedonian, frigate, 197. 

Mackay, William, 269. 

Mackerel Lane (Kilby Street), 105. 

Mackintosh, Captain," 397, 399. 

Macready, W. C, first appearance in 
Boston, 259, 394. 

Madison, James, 105. 

Magaw, Robert, 373. 

Magnalia, Mather's, 4. 

Magnifique, French seventy-four, lost 
in Boston harbor, 180, 437. 

Main-guard, British, 90. 

Main Street, 22. 

Malbone, Edward G., residence of, 
353. 

Malcom, Captain Daniel, 207. 

Manley, Captain John, captures by, 
220 ; dies, 220. 

Mann, Horace, statue of, 345. 

Manners and customs, 11, 12. 

Manufactory House, 39 ; site, 301 ; 
description of, 302, 303, 304 ; excise 
laid on carriages in support of, 302 ; 
attempt to occupy it by troops, 303 ; 
Massachusetts Bank in, 303 ; build- 
ing sold, 303 ; occupied by wounded, 
203, 303, 313. 

Marbleliead, stage to, 26 ; Frankland's 
courtship, 162 ; Constitution chased 
into, 187. 

Marbury, Rev. Francis, 63. 
20* 



Margaret Street, 218. 

Marion, Joseph, establishes first insur- 
ance ofl[ice, 107. 

Marion, sloop-of-war, 185. 

Market Dock, 127. See Town Dock. 

Market Place, first, 89 ; in 1708, 127. 

Market Square, 132. 

Market Street (New Cornhill), built, 
76. 

Marlborough Hotel, 225 ; dinner to 
Lafayette, 364. 

Marlborough, John, Duke of, street 
named for, 225, 237. 

Marlborough Street named, 225, 235 ; 
new location of, 271, 385 ; named 
Washington Street, 420. 

Marquis of Lome, 272. 

Marston, Captain John, innkeeper, 
105, 

Marshall, John, Chief Justice, 38. 

Marshall Street, 143. 

Marshall, Thomas, 24, 202. 

Marshall Wyzeman opens Eagle Thea- 
tre, 378 ; opens theatre in Boylston 
Hall, 404. 

Marshfield, 46. 

Martin, Mr., 283. 

Martin, Mrs., 389. 

Mascarene, Jean Paul, 60. 

Mason, Jonathan, 335. 

Mason, Jonathan, Jr., 389. 

Mason, Lowell, 259. See Odeon. 

Mason Street, Hatch's Tavern in, 313 ; 
South Writing-School in, 314 ; Med- 
ical College in, 317 ; boundary of 
Common, 296. 

Masonic Temple (old), description of, 
312 ; Alcott's school, 312. 

Masonic Temple (new), 318, 319. 

Massachusetts Bank, site of British 
Coffee House, 108 ; first location, 
303. 

Massachusetts cent, description and 
history of, 423. 

Massachusetts Charitable Fire Society, 
266. 

Massachusetts Company, 47. 

Massachusetts Constitutional Conven- 
tion, 45. 

Massachusetts Frigate built, 179. 
DD 



466 



INDEX. 



Massachusetts General Hospital, in- 
corporated and endowed, 247, 317 ; 
site and history of, 376, 377 ; ether 
first used in, 376. 

Massachusetts Historical Society, 5. 

Massachusetts Hospital Life Insurance 
Company, 384. 

Massachusetts Indians, 2, 8. 

Massachusetts Medical College in Ma- 
son Street, description, 317 ; in Grove 
Street, 376 ; Parkman murder, 378. 

Massachusetts Mechanics' Charitable 
Association, first meetings of, 71, 120, 
147 ; early meetings, 149, 181 ; build 
Revere House, 371. 

Massachusetts Spy printed, 223 ; re- 
moved to Worcester, 223 ; different 
locations of, 391 ; enterprise of, 433. 

Massachusetts Volunteers (Mexican 
war), entry of, into Boston, 333. 

Mather, Cotton, 4, 8, 57, 160 ; res- 
idence of, 161, 162 ; portrait of, 
372. 

Mather, Hannah. See Crocker, 175. 

Mather, Rev. Increase, 65, 80, 160 ; res- 
idence, 161 ; house burnt, 169 ; 
agent, 210, 391. 

Matlier, Rev. Richard, 160, 412. 

Mather, Samuel, 160 ; residence, 161, 
162 ; protects Governor Hutchinson, 
l&Q ; pastor of First Universalist 
Church, 172. 

Matignon, Rev. Father, 255. 

Mathews' Block, 175. 

Matoonas, shot, 331, 

Matthews, Cliarles, 403, 

Matthews Street, 280. 

Maverick Church, 416. 

Maverick, Samuel, 13, 174. 

May, John, residence of, 171. 

Mayhew, Rev. Jonathan, 118, 374. 

Maynard, J. E., stables of, 371. 

Mcintosh, Mr., 283. 

McLean Asylum, 377. 

McLean, Jolin, residence, 307 ; anec- 
dote of, 307 ; bequest to Hospital, 
377. 

McLean Street, 376. 

McLellan, Mr., 364, 

McMurtie, Mr, 276. 



McNeil, Captain, 196, 

Mears, Samuel, innkeeper, 286, 428, 

Medal voted to Washington, 432. 

Mein, John, establishes first circulat- 
ing library, 106 ; sliop, 197, 

Melodeon, sketch of, 394, 

Melvill, Thomas, Tea Party, 282; 
preserves small bottle of the tea, 
283 ; residence and sketch of, 372, 
373, 406. 

Melville, Herman, 372. 

Melyne's Corner, 289. 

Mercantile Library, 278, 

Mercer, Captain George, 62. 

Merchants' Bank, 94. See United 
States Bank. 

Merchants' Exchange, present, corner- 
stone laid, 278. 

Merchants' Hall, site and use of, as 
Post-Oflice and Exchange, 269, 

Mercliants' Row, named, 108 ; first 
house of entertainment in, 108, 109, 
110, 112 ; Triangular Warehouse in, 
131. 

Meriam, William, innkeeper, 287. 

Merry's Point, 176. 

Merry, Walter, his point, 176. 

Messinger, Colonel, 139 ; shop, 393, 
394. 

Methodist Alley, See Hanover Avenue, 
173, 

Metropolitan Place, 419. 

Metternich, Prince, 321. 

Mexican war, 333, 

Mexican Volunteers, quarters of, 379 ; 
neglect and abuse of, 379 ; their 
flag, 379. 

Miantonimoh in Boston, 108. 

Middle Street (Hanover), 153. 

Miildlecott Street, 370. See Bowdoin. 

Middlesex Canal, 24, 152. 

Mifflin, Thomas, 116, 220, 429. 

Miles, Mrs., Governor Eustis lodges 
with, 365. 

Military Company of the Massachu- 
setts. See Ancient and Honorable 
Artillery, 137. 

Milk, John, 206. 

Milk, Mrs., 287. 

Milk Street, 10 ; Museum in, 41 ; Post- 



INDEX. 



467 



Office in, 104, 105 ; inhabitants re- 
moved, 227 ; route of Tea Party, 
230 ; Province House opposite, 235 ; 
ancient Fort Street, description of, 
251, 264 ; notable residents of, 271 ; 
great fire in, 272. 

Mill Bridge, 149, 152. 

Mill Creek, 127, 131, 132 ; bridged, 
151 ; description of, 152 ; a canal, 
152. 

Mill Dam, 25. 

Miller, William, 367. 

Mill Field. See Copp's Hill. 

Mill Pond, 7, 8, 10, 126, 127, 145 ; de- 
scription of, 150, 151, 152 ; filled 
up, 152 ; Baptist Church on, 222 ; 
Beacon Hill used for filling, 350, 
369 ; Theatre on site of, 378. 

Mill Pond Corporation, 151. 

Milmore, Martin, 344. 

Milton, first paper-mill in colony at, 
76. 

Milton Place, 268. 

Minot's Building, 402. 

Minot, George Richards, 39, 264. 

Minot, George, 315 ; anecdote of, 431. 

Minot, John, 431. 

Minot, Stephen, petition of, 430. 

Minot, William, 320 ; office, 402. 

Minot Street, 375. 

Minott, Stephen, 114. See Tea Wliarf, 
115. 

Mint, established by Massachusetts, 
422 ; site of, 423. 

Molesworth, Captain Ponsonby, 97. 

Molineux, William, 282, 302 ; resi- 
dence and sketch of, 357. 

Monck, George, innkeeper, 122. 

Monroe, James, visit to Boston of, 100, 
319. 

Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley, 103. 

Montague, W. (Admiral), anecdotes 
of, 75, 283. 

Montague, W. H., 69, 365. 

Montague, Rev. William, 217 ; the 
bullet which killed Warren, 218 ; 
anecdote of, 414. 

Montgomery Place, 294. 

Monument (Beacon Hill), 349 ; history 
and description of, 350, 351 ; inscrip- 



tions, 350, 351 ; rebuilding author- 
ized, 352, 370. 

Moon Street, 159 ; Samuel Mather, 
a resident of, .161, 166 ; Sun Tavern 
in, 287. 

Moore, Peggy, tavern of, 404. 

Moore, Thomas, 283. 

Moorhead, Rev. John, 263. 

Moreau, General, 139 ; funeral l 
320 ; visit to Boston, 320 ; resi 
dence, 321 ; returns to Europe, 321 ; 
death, 321. 

Morgan, General Daniel, incident of 
battle of Stillwater, 327. 

Morris, Commodore Charles, 99, 186. 

Moi-ris, Gouverneur, anecdote of, 429. 

Morrison, Rev. Dr., 124. 

Morse, Jedediah, 8 ; humorous de- 
scription of Albany, 422. 

Morse, S. F. B., 277. 

Morton, Joseph, innkeeper, 393. 

Morton, Marcus, 253. 

Morton, Perez, residence of, 113, 393 ; 
last of the barristers, 403 ; district- 
attorney, 424. 

Morton Place named, 253. 

Morton, Thomas, 2. 

Morton, W. T. G., office where ether 
was first applied, 366 ; curious state- 
ment about the ether discovery, 366. 

Mount Auburn Chapel, statue of Win- 
throp in, 226. 

Mountfort, Col. John, 221. Jos., 283. 

Mountfort's Corner, 158. 

Mount Hoardam. See Mount Ver- 
non. 

Mountjoy's Corner, 158. 

Mount Vernon proprietors, 4 ; use 
first railway in New England, 325. 

Mount Wollaston, 2, 14. 

Mount Vernon Place, 339. 

Mount Vernon Street, 338, 340 ; called 
Sumner and Olive Street, 352. 

Mount Vernon, 6 ; called JNIount Hoar- 
dam, 329. 

Mower, Samuel, 206. 

Mu(hly River, 14. 

Munroe, W., innkeeper, 248. 

Murdoch, James E., 404. 

Muhlenburg, General, 356. 



468 



INDEX. 



Murray, General James, 327. 

Murray, Rev. John, 172. 

Museum, Boston, 38, 40, 41, 294 ; Co- 
lumbian, 41 ; burnt, 41, 42 ; New 
England, 42, 74 ; New York, 42 ; 
Mix's New Haven, 42 ; Wood's Mar- 
ket, 132 ; New England, 132. 

Musgrave, Philip, Postmaster of Bos- 
ton, 79. 

Music Hall, 294 ; one in Brattle 
Street, 307, 394. 

Mushawomuk, 3. 

Myles Standish expedition to Boston 
Bay, 2 ; costume, 11 ; sword of, 
40. 

Mylne Point (Hudson's), 24. 

Mylne Street. Se.e Summer Street. 

Mystic, 8 ; River, 2, 



K 



Nancy, British ordnance brig, captured, 
220. 

Nantasket Road, British lieet in, 65, 
75, 115. 

Napoleon Bonaparte, 139, 141 ; Mos- 
cow campaign, 320, 321. 

Napoleon, Louis, in Boston, 101. 

Nason, Elias, 145, 162. 

Nassau Street, description of, 412. 

National Lancers, 379. 

National Theatre, history of, 378. 

Naval Academy (Annapolis), 193 ; 
established, 385. 

Naval Rendezvous, North Square, 
159. 

Neal, Daniel, 16. 

Neck, Tlie, 7, 10, 21, 23, 24, 25, 43, 94, 
214 ; Governor Burnet's reception, 
238, 244 ; cathedral on, 256 ; Earl 
Percy's troops march over, 304 ; lines 
on, 328 ; retreat of the British from, 
416 ; description of, 418, 419 ; early 
condition of, 419 ; road over, 419, 
420 ; paved, 420, 421 ; dikes built to 
protect, 420 ; dreary aspect of, 421 ; 
a resort for sportsmen, 421 ; fenced 
in, 421 ; houses on, 421 ; brickyards, 
422 ; guard stationed on, 424 ; forti- 



fied, 424 ; British works on, 425, 426 ; 
partly demolislied, 426 ; American 
works, 427 ; taverns on, 428, 429, 
430 ; entry of American and French 
armies, 432 to 437. 

Nelson, Horatio, Lord, 186. 

Neptune, French ship, 437. 

Nereide, French ship, 437. 

Nesbitt, Colonel, 229. 

New Boston, 10. 

Newbury Street, 20 ; new location of, 
291 ; residents of, 391 ; named 
Washington, 420. 

New England Bank, 105. 

New England flag, description of, 179. 

New England Guards, 191 ; in 1812, 
322 ; survivors, 322. 

New England House, 132. 

New England Journal, 8. 

New Exhibition Room (Board Alley), 
opening of, 261 ; bill of first per- 
formance, 261. 

New Fields. See West Boston. 

New Guinea, 199. 

New Haven, 55, 57. 

Newman, Henry, residence of, 291. 

Newman, Captain Samuel, 221. 

New North Church, 155 ; site and 
sketch of, 173, 416. 

Newport, R. I., 9, 19, 29. 

New South Church, 228 ; site and his- 
tory of, 380, 381. 

News Letter, where published, 82, 104. 

New State House first occupied, 91. 

Newton, Thomas, 32. 

New York, 22. 

Nichols, Colonel Richard, 174. 

Nicholson, Captain Samuel, 182, 184, 
186, 187, 221. 

Niles's Block, 60. 

Noah's Ark, 175, See Ship Tavern. 

Noddle's Island, 13, 14, 23, 56 ; Bap- 
tists meet on, 222 ; works erected in 
1814, 247 ; garrisoned, 322, 418. 

Norfolk County Road, 27. 

Norman, John, publishes first direc- 
tory, 110 ; office, 145. 

North Allen Street, 377. 

North American Review, first number 
of, 304. 



INDEX. 



469 



North Battery, 116 ; history of, 176, 
177 ; sold, 177 ; armament, 177. 

North Bemiet Street, Methodist Chapel 
in, 172. 

Nortli Burying- Place. See Copp's 
Hill. 

North Carolina, white slavery in, 14. 

North Church, 19. 

North End, 10, 19, 25, 26, 27, 68, 143 ; 
three streets wide, 152 ; British 
troops in, 158 ; patriotism of and 
famous residents in, 220, 221, 222 ; 
draft riot in, 223. 

North End Cotiee House, site of, 171. 

North Grammar Schools, 218. 

North Latin School, 218. 

North Latin School Street. See Ben- 
net Street. 

North Margin Street, 150. 

North Market Street, 105 ; Triangular 
Warehouse in, 131. 

North Mills, 151. 

North Row, location of, 371. 

North Square, 130 ; description of, 
156 to 170 ; rendezvous for tooops, 
158 ; barracks in, 168 ; Bethel 
Church in, 169; fire of 1676, 169. 
198. 

North Street, 7, 26, 127 ; Wood's 
Museum in, 132 ; drawbridge at, 152. 

North Street (Hanover), 153. 

Northumberland, Duke of, 407 ; lodg- 
ings in Boston, 410. 

Northumberland, French ship, 437. 

North Writing School, 218. 

Norton, Mrs., 227. 

Noyes, Oliver, builds Long Wharf 
114. 



Oak of Reformation, 398. 

Obbatinewat, 2. 

Ochterlony, Sir David, residence of, 
153, 154. 

O'Connor, Captain, 283. 

Odeon. See Boston Theatre, 259. 

Orange Street, 21, 102 ; extent and 
name, 401 ; description, 420 ; named 
Washington, 420 ; paved, 421. 



Old Brick Church. See First Church. 
Orations of the Cincinnati in, 105, 
155 ; Washington attends, 432. 

Old buildings, one corner Sun Court 
and Moon Streets, 159. 

Old Burying-Place (King's Chapel 
Yard), 35, 55, 56. 

Old Cocked Hat in Dock Square, his- 
tory and description of, 132, 133. 

Old Corner (Court and Tremont), Ed- 
ward Webster's Company enlisted, 
379. 

Old Corner Bookstore, 62. 

Old Drury. See Boston Theatre, 256. 

Old Fortifications, 420, 421 ; erected, 
424 ; history of, 424 ; armament, 
424 ; garrison, 425. 

Old Market House, 130, 133. 

Old North Church, location and his- 
tory of, 160 ; burnt, 169 ; Sir Wil- 
liam Phips attends, 210, 218. 

Old Prison. See Boston Jail. 

Old South Block, 253. 

Old South Church, 22, 30 ; keys de- 
manded by Andros, 34, 35, 52, 148, 
182, 213 ; Dr. Blagden resigns pas- 
torate of, 220 ; history and descrip- 
tion of, 227, 228; Lady Andros's 
funeral, 228 ; Warren's Address in, 
229 ; Tea Party Meeting, 230 ; occu- 
pation by British troops, 231, 232, 
329 ; tablet, 228 ; clock, 234, 244, 
282, 348 ; Governor Eustis's funeral, 
366, 392, 416. 

Old State House, 34, 43 ; used as 
Town House, 58, 59 ; history and 
description of, 89, 90, 91 ; Court 
House, 90 ; alterations, 91 ; pro- 
posal to build the United States 
Bank on site of, 94 ; Post-Office in, 
105 ; Selfridge killed near, 114 ; first 
market on site of, 130 ; rendezvous 
of Ancient and Honorable Artillery, 
138, 210, 238 ; monument to Wolfe, 
241 ; Federal Convention assembled 
in, 263, 293 ; Speaker's desk, 347 ; 
descrijition of Council Chamber, 
347, .391, 431. 
Old Stone House (Cross Street), de- 
scription of, 154, 155. 



470 



INDEX. 



Old Way, The, 151. 

Old Wliarf. See Barricado. 

Olive Street. See Mount Vernon. 

Oliver, Governor Andrew, 267, 273 ; 
residence, 278 ; mobbed, 278 ; dies, 
278 ; sketch of, 278, 279 ; hung in 
effigy, 399 ; resigns office of Stamp- 
Master, 400. 

Oliver's Dock, 109 ; named for, 110 ; 
scene of destruction of Stamp-Office, 
110. 

Oliver, Peter, 110 ; leaves Boston, 278. 

Oliver Place, 409. 

Oliver Street, 41 ; named, 271 ; paved, 
272 

Oliver, Thomas, residence of, 234. 

Orange Tree Lane, 68. 

Orange Tree (tavern), 25, 70. 

Orne, Azor, 341. 

Osgood, James R., and Company, 
304. 

Ostinelli, Mr., 291. 

Ostinelli, Eliza, debut of, 368. 

Otis, Harrison Gray, 14 ; law office, 
44 ; anecdotes of, 46, 47, 57, 124, 
190 ; first public speech, 256 ; op- 
poses theatres, 261, 336 ; residence, 
337. 

Otis, James, 44 ; residence, 60, 71, 76, 
89, 133, 135, 148, 149, 248, 252, 253, 
269, 351, 402. 

Otis Street, American headquarters, 
383 ; Sir William Pepperell's estate, 
384. 

Oxenbridge, John, 35, 55 ; house, 
56. 

Oxford, Loid, 78. 



P. 



Paddy's Alley, 153. 

Paddock, Adino, 26 ; names Long 
Acre, 289 ; residence, 294 ; plants 
trees in Long Acre, 294 ; Captain of 
Artillery, 295 ; intends surrender- 
ing his guns, 314 ; intention frus- 
trated, 314. 

Paddock's Mall, history of, 294, 295, 
360. 



Paige, E., and Company, innkeepeis 
105. 

Paine, Nathaniel, 237. 

Paine, Robert Treat, 57 ; residence, 
265 ; died, 265, 267 ; sketch of, 
266. 

Paine, Thomas (R. Treat, Jr.), writes 
prize address for Federal Street Thea- 
tre, 256 ; sketch of 266. 

Painter's Arms, description of, 144. 

Palfrey, Rev. J. G., 123, 355. 

Palmer, Edward, 15, 34. Jos., 283. 

Palmer, Mr., residence of, 277. 

Pantheon Hall. See Boylston. 

Paper Currency, 237. 

Park Square, 322. 

Park Street, 148, 299 ; Workhouse and 
Bridewell in, 299 ; town property on, 
sold, 300 ; Pound in, 300. 

Park Street Church, 182, 234 ; spire 
of, 300 ; history of, 301 ; architect 
of, 301 ; capitals cut by Willard, 
311. 

Park Theatre (New York), opening of, 
417. 

Parker, Bishop, anecdote of, 414. 

Parker Block site of, 248. 

Parker, Chief Justice, 100. 

Parker House, 57, 65. 

Parker, Isaac, 82. 

Parker, John. 196 ; residence of, 291. 

Parker, Captain John, his musket, 
347. 

Parker, Rev. Samuel, 387. 

Parker, Rev. Theodore, bequeaths rel- 
ics to the State, 346, 379, 394. 

Parkman, Dr. George, 165 ; residence, 
338, 371 ; scene of murder, 377. 

Parkman, Samuel, 141, 196 ; residence, 
371. 

Parris, Alexander, architect of Samt 
Paul's, 310. 

Parsons, Eben, 196. 

Parsons, Theopliilus, residence of, 277 ; 
anecdote of, 277 ; J. Q. Adams a stu- 
dent with, 319, 403. 

Parsons, Thoophilns, Jr., 277. 

Patten, William, malt-house of, 416. 

Patterson, Miss, 384. 

Paving of streets, 21. 



INDEX. 



471 



Pavilion, 56. 

Paxton, Charles, residence of, 273 ; 

mobbed, 273, 277. 
Payne, John Howiu-d, 253 ; at Boston 

Theatre, 259 ; residence and sketch 

of, 262 ; dies, 262, 313. 
Payne, Mr., 253. 
Payson, Joseph, 282. 
Peabody, Ephraini, 46. 
Peabody, George, 27. 
Peale, Charles W,, student of Copley, 

353. 
Peale, Rembrandt, 335. 
Pearl Street, 37 ; route of Tea Party, 

271 ; Admiral Graves's quarters, 

272 ; called Hutchinson Street, 273 ; 
named, 273 ; shoe market, 280. 

Pearl Street House, 248, 275. 

Peck, John, purchases Province House, 
246. 

Peck, Samuel, 282 ; shop, 410. 

Pel by, William, 291 ; opens Warren 
Theatre, 378. 

Pelham, Charles, 32. 

Pelham, Mary, residence, 371 ; adver- 
tisement, 372. 

Pelham, Peter, residence, 372 ; an en- 
graver, 372. 

Pelican, British brig, 197. 

Pemberton, Rev. Ebenezer, 104. 

Pemberton Hill, 6, 8, 10, 34, 47, 52, 
365, 389. 

Pemberton House, 50. 

Pemberton, James, 47. 

Pemberton S([uare, 50, 53. 

Pemberton, Thomas, 134, 154 ; ac- 
count of commerce of Boston, 179, 
180. 

Penfold, 383. 

Penn, James, 56. 

Pennsylvania Academy, 276. 

Penobscot Expedition, 120. 

Pepperell, Sir William, sword of, 40, 
239 ; forces on the Common, 326. 

Pepperell, Sir William (Sparhawk), 
57 ; estate and sketch of, 384. 

Pepys, Richard, 4, 5. 

Percy, Earl of Northumberland, 44 ; 
quarters, 53, 242, 245, 265 ; marches 
for Lexington, 304 ; occupies Han- 



cock House, 340 ; commands on 
Boston Neck, 426. 

Perkins, Augustus T., 336. 

Perkins, James, 37, 196, 280. 

Perkins, Sergeant, 16. 

Perkins, Thomas, residence of, 291. 

Perkins, Thomas H., 38, 196 ; resi- 
dence, 277, 278 ; commands Cadets, 
294. 

Perkins Street named, 280. 

Perley, Rev. Mr., 277. 

Perodi, Mr., suicide of, 363. 

Perry, Commodore 0. H., at Exchange 
Cotfee House, 100. 

Pest-House Point, 369. 

Peters, Edward D., residence and re- 
mains of fortifications, 426. 

Peterson hanged, 426. 

Pettick's Island, 116. 

Pfaffs Hotel, 322. 

Philadelphia Coffee House, 171. See 
North End Coffee House. 

Philadelphia, frigate, 186. 

Phillips, Adelaide, 40. 

Phillips, Edward B., 38. 

Phillips Church, 416. 

Phillips, Deacon John, 154. 

Phillips, General William, 231, 383. 

Phillips, Gillam, 332. 

Phillips, Governor William, 53 ; resi- 
dence, 54, 55, 56, 100, 196, 337, 
362. 

Phillips, Henry, 96, 332, 393. 

Phillips, John, first mayor, 14 ; resi- 
dence, 337. • 

Phillips, R., 258. 

Phillips, Wendell, residence of, 337, 
379. 

Phillips, William, Sr., 302. 

Phillips's Pasture, 409. 

Pliips, Mary, anecdote of, 210. 

Phips Place, 209. 

Phips, Spencer, residence of, 211. See 
David Bennet. 

Phips, Sir William, 200 ; residence, 
209 ; arrival in Boston, 210, 211. 

Phoebe, frigate, 171. 

Pickering, John, 39. 

Pickering, Timothy, 100. 

Pierce's Alley (Change Avenue), 105. . 



472 



INDEX. 



Pierce, William, shop of, 145, 283. 

Pierpont, Rev. John, sketch of, 415. 

Pierpont (and Storey), set in pillory, 93. 

Pillmore, Rev. Joseph, 172. 

Pillory, incidents of, 92, 93, 313. 

Piuckney Street, 334. 

Pine Street Church, 220. 

Pitcairn, Major John, quarters of, 158, 
159 ; death and burial, 217. 

Pitt, William, 141. 

Pitts, Hon. James, residence of, 369. 

Pitts, Lendall, one of Tea Party lead- 
ers, 282, 283. 

Pitts Street, Mexican Volimteers in, 
379. 

Pitts Wharf, 127. 

Pleasant Street, 64, 305 ; laboratory 
in, 322 ; British works in, 328. 

Pleiades or Seven Star Inn, site of, 387. 

Plymouth Colony, 2 ; relics of, 347. 

Plymouth, Mass., 2. 

Plymouth Rock, Choate's mot on, 219. 

Poinsett, Joel R., 139, 192. 

Point Alderton, 116, 188. 

Point Judith, named for, 212. 

Polk, James K., 385. 

Pollard, Aime, her landing and deposi- 
tion, 5. 

Pollard, Colonel Benjamin, 115. 

Pomeroy, Colonel (British), 285. 

Pomeroy, General Seth, 208. 

Pomeroy, Zadock, 248. 

Pond Lane. See Bedford Street. 

Pond Street. See Bedford. 

Ponsonby, Lord, 97. 

Poor debtors, 375. 

Poore, Benjamin Perley, owner of 
Franklin's press, 80 ; relics of Prov- 
ince House, 247. 

Pope, Alexander, 38. 

Pope Day, 107 ; description of, 149, 
150,' 167 ; anniversary celebrated, 
399. 

Poplar Street, 370. 

Population of Boston, 20, 21. 

Pormont, Philemon, 56. 

Porter, David, Sr., residence of, 171. 

Porter, Commodore David, 111 ; res- 
idence of, 171, 186. 

Porter, Admiral David D., 171. 



Porter, Thomas, 282. 

Portland Street, 126, 145. 

Portsmouth, New Hampshire, 45 ; first 
stage-coach to, 26. 

Portsmouth, flying stage-coach, 26. 

Post-Office in Old State House, 89 ; on 
site Brazier's Building, 92 ; in Mer- 
chants' Exchange, 269 ; history and 
locations of, 104 ; corner Congress 
and Water Streets, 104 ; New, 141, 
254 ; in Summer Street, 385. 

Post-routes, first established, 104 ; 
post-rider to Hartford, 253. 

Poimd, site of, 300. 

Powder, scarcity of, in American camp, 
430, 431. 

Powder-house on the Common, 329 ; 
at West Boston, 329 ; duel near, 332 ; 
on the Copley tract, 334 ; desci'ip- 
tion of, 334. 

Powder-mill, first in New England, 
118. 

Powell, Charles S., first manager of 
Federal Street Theatre, 256, 257 ; 
fits up a theatre in Hawley Street, 
261 ; opens Haymarket, 318. 

Powell, Jeremiah, 346. 

Powers, Hiram, 38, 345. 

Powers, Michael, hanged, 424. 

Pownall, Governor Tliomas, 40, 236, 
240 ; anecdote of, 241, 348. 

Pratt, Benjamin, oifice and description 
of, 402. 

Preble, Ebenezer, residence of, 382. 

Preble, Edward E., 195. 

Preble, Commodore Edward, 111, 186, 
187, 211. 

Preble, Captain George H., 179, 184. 

Prentis's, Captain Henry, residence of, 
148, 282. 

Prescott, Colonel William, sword of, 
40, 208. 

Prescott, Judge William, 277 ; resi- 
dence of, 390. 

Prescott, W. H., 38 ; residence of, 333 ; 
blindness, and literary work, 334. 

President's Roads, 187. 

Preston, Captain Tliomas, 71, 85 ; de- 
fence, 126, 166, 266 ; trial, 402. 

Price, Roger, 386. 



INDEX. 



473 



Price, William, 32. 

Prince, John, residence of, 275, 283. 

Prince Library, 234. 

Prince of Orange, 401. 

Prince Street, 151, 153, 162, 202 : 
named, 219 ; description, 219 ; 
British barracks in, 219. See Black 
Horse Lane. 

Prince, Thomas, 52 ; library burned, 
231. 

Prince's Pasture, 376. 

Princess Louise, 272. 

Prison Lane, 229. 

Proctor, Edward, 282. 

Proctor's Lane, 219. See Richmond 
Street. 

Proctor's School-house, 223. 

Prospect Hill, 203. 

Protector, frigate, 211. 

Protector, ship, 186. 

Province Hospital, location of, 369. 

Province House, 64, 65, 225, 232 ; his- 
tory and description of, 235 to 248 ; 
location, 235 ; first gubernatorial oc- 
cupant, 236 ; successive inhabitants, 
236 to 245 ; robbery in, 242 ; Lex- 
ington expedition planned in, 242 ; 
divulged by a groom, 243 ; Church's 
treason discovered in, 243 ; built, 
246 ; purchased by the colony, 246 ; 
occupied by State officers, 246 ; 
stvled Government House, 246 ; 
sold, 246 ; relics of, 247, 293, 431. 

Province Pest-House. See Hospital. 

Province Snow, 48. 

Province Street, 64. 

Provincial Congress, 159. 

Public Garden occupied by ropewalks, 
324 ; a marsh, 325 ; secured to the 
city, 325 ; Ticknor's bequest, 352. 

Public Library, 313 ; relic in, 323. 

Pudding Lane, 98. 

Pulaski, Count, 264, 310. 

Purcliase Street, 87 ; named, 273 ; 
rope-field in, 273 ; birthplace of 
Samuel Adams, 281 ; description of, 
309. 

Purkett, Henry, anecdote of, 264, 282, 
410. 

Putnam, Colonel, 364, 



Putnam, General Israel, 69, 129 ; at 
Bunker Hill, 207, 208, 220 ; to as- 
sault Boston, 359 ; commands in 
Boston, 382, 432. 



Q. 

Quakers, 15 ; persecution of, 268 ; 
build first brick meeting - house, 
268. 

Quaker Burying-Ground, site and his- 
tory of, 267, 268 ; remains exhumed, 
268. 

Quaker Lane, 101. See Congress 
Street. 

Quaker Meeting-house, 101 ; site and 
history of, 267, 268 ; burnt, 267 ; in 
Milton Place, 268. 

Queen's Ball last held in Boston, 
246. 

Queen's Chappell, 33. 

Queen Street, 65 ; changed to Court, 
77 ; Franklin's printing-office, SO. 

Queen's Light Dragoons, 231. 

Quincy Block, 279. 

Quincy, Dorothy. See Hancock and 
Scott. 

Quincy, Edmund (son of Josiah), 212. 

Quincy, E. S., 54, 188. 

Quincy, Josiah, 14, 23, 82 ; improves 
Town Dock, 128, 129, 130, 139, 196 ; 
birthplace, 248 ; establishes House 
of Industry and Keiormation, 249 ; 
President of Harvard, 249 ; anecdotes 
of, 250, 279, 354 ; reception of La- 
fayette, 356 ; Neck paved by, 421. 

Quincy, Josiah, Jr. (Mayor), 23 ; res- 
idence, 357. 

Quincy, Josiah, Jr. (patriot), resi- 
dence, 248 ; dies, 249 ; sketch of, 
249 ; Mrs. Sigourney's lines on, 249. 

Quincy, Judith, 212. 

Quincy, Mass., President Monroe at, 
100. 

Quincy Market, 127 ; description, 128, 
129. 

Quincy Place, 275, 280 ; trees in, 
409. 

Quincy, town of, 14, 26. 



474 



INDEX. 



R. 



Railways, experiment, 26, 278 ; Low- 
ell, 26, 151, 350 ; Worcester, 26 ; 
Providence, 26 ; Maine, 26, 151 ; 
Eastern, 26, 151, 350 ; Old Colony, 
27 ; Fitchburg, 27, 151 ; Hartford 
and Erie (Norfolk County), 27. 

Rainbow, British ship, 220. 

Rainsford, Edward, 404. 

Rainsford's Island, 188. 

Rainsford's Lane, See Harrison Ave- 
nue. 

Rand, Isaac, 363. 

Randolph, Edward, first Collector, 34, 
156, 157, 200 ; imprisoned, 285. 

Randolph, town of, 14. 

Rantoul, Robert, portrait of, 346. 

Ratcliff, Rev. Robert, 34. 

Rawdon, Francis, 203. 

Rawson, Edward, 222. 

Rawson, Grindal, 3. 

Rawson's Lane. See Bromfield Street. 

Raymond, James, 394. 

Read, John, residence of, 402. 

Red Lvon Inn, site of, 156 ; fire of 
1676', 169. 

Red Lyon Wharf, 157. 

Reed, Commodore George W., 189. 

Reed, Joshua, 429. 

Reed, William, store attacked, 224. 

Rehoboth, 5. 

Repertory, The (newspaper), 91. 

Reservoir grounds, 338, 350, 352. 

Revenge Cliurch. See Second Church. 

Revere, Paul, 32, 61 ; celebrated ride, 
69 ; shop, 118 ; foundry, 120, 148, 
149 ; residence of, 159, 211 ; en- 
graves and jjrints money for Pro- 
vincial Congress, 159, 173, 182 ; 
narrative of ride to Lexington, 214, 
243, 282; shop, 338; illustrates 
Stamp Act repeal, 359, 371. 

Revere House, site of, 371 ; named, 
371 ; distinguished guests, 371. 

Revere Place, 211. 

Revere's cannon and bell foundry, 200. 

Rice, Benjamin, 282. 

Richards, John, shipyard of, 178. 

Richmond Street, 19, 155, 156, 157,198. 



Riedesel, General Baron, 231, 324. 

Rimmer, Dr., 344. 

Riot of 1863, 142. 

Ripley, Henry J., residence of, 222. 

Robertson, Alexander, 313. 

Robin, L'Abbe, his description of Bos- 
ton, 18, 19, 114. 

Robinson, John, assaults James Otis, 
108, 253. 

Robinson, William, executed, 330. 

Rochambeau, Jean Baptiste, Count de, 
18, 61 ; army of, 113, 429. 

Rochefoucauld, Liancourt, Duke de, 
141. 

Rochester, Earl of, 34. 

Rodgers, Commodore John, 186, 188. 

Roebuck Passage, 131. See Merchant's 
Row. 

Roebuck Tavern, 131. 

Rog, John P., hanged, 424. 

Rogei's, Daniel D., residence of, 358. 

Rogers, Isaiah, architect of Tremont 
House, 290; of Tremont Theatre, 
293 ; of Howard Athenaeum, 368. 

Rogers, Simon, innkeeper, 428. 

Rogers, Rev. William M., 259. 

Roman Catholic Church, mass first 
celebrated in, 64. 

Romney, frigate, 170. 

Romney, Lord, 78. 

Ropes, William, residence of, 366. 

Ropewalks, first, 273 ; in Pearl Street, 
273 ; at Barton's Point, 273 ; riot at, 
in Pearl Street, 274 ; at the 'foot of 
Common, 324- burnt, 325 ; title of 
proprietors purchased, 325 ; on Bea- 
con Hill, 329, 352. 

Rose, frigate, 34. 

Ross, General, burns Washington, 
369. 

Rostopchin, Governor, burning of Mos- 
cow, 320. 

Rouillard, innkeeper, 254. 

Round Marsh, The, 305. 

Rowe, John, suggests throwing the tea 
overboard, 230 ; residence of, 390. 

Rowe Street nameil, 230, 390. 

Rowe's Wharf, 109, 284. 

Rowse, Samuel, 40. 

Rowson, Mrs, Susanna, at Federal 



INDEX. 



475 



street Theatre, 258 ; establishes 
school for young ladies, 259 ; school, 
429. 

Roxbury, 17 ; annexed, 23. 

Royal Custom House, site in 1770, 97, 
98. 

Royal Deux Fonts regiment, 434 ; uni- 
form, 435. 

Royal Exchange Lane, 96. 

Royal Excliange, London, 136. 

Royal Excliange Tavern, location of, 
9*6, 97, 98. 

Royal Marines, part of, in Lexington 
expedition, 304. 

Ruby, Ann, 206. 

Riidhall, Abel, 214, 215. 

Ruggles, Samuel, builds Faneuil Hall, 
135. 

Rumford, Count (Benjamin Thomp- 
son), 39 ; apprentice in Cornhill, 86, 
87, 154. 

Russell, Benjamin, 100, 207 ; anecdote 
of, 266 ; anecdote and residence of, 
388. 

Russell, John, 282. 

Russell, Joseph, 76. See Green. 

Russell, Joseph, Jr., 389. 

Russell, Thomas, 96, 180, 184, 253, 
383. 

Russell, Hon. Thomas, Collector of 
Boston, 169. 

Russell, William, 283. 



S. 



to 



Sabin, Thomas, puts on first 
Providence, 392. 

Sabiue, Lorenzo, 97, 410. 

Sailor's Home, 87. 

Saint Andrew's Lodge, 150. 

Saint Helena, 139. 

Saint James Hotel, 96. 

Saint Maime, Count de, 435. 

Saint-Onge (regiment), 435. 

Salem, 25, 27, 35. 

Salem Church, 210, 220. 

Salem Street, 7 ; widened, 145 ; called 
Back Street, 153 ; description of, 
213, 219 ; origin, 219 ; Massachu- 
setts Spy printed in, 223. 



Saltonstall, Colonel Richard, 33. 
Salutation Street (Alley), 175. 
Salutation Tavern, site of, 175 ; ren- 
dezvous of the Boston Caucus, 176. 
Sandeman, Robert, 107, 212. See 

Mein. 
Sandemanians, first meetings of, 150 ; 

Chapel, 172. 
Saratoga, battle of, 87, 103. 
Sargent, Henry, 104, 141. 
Sargent, Lucius M. (Sigma), 114, 332, 

353, 384. 
Savage, Arthur, 217, 218. 
Savage, James, 227. 
Savannah, Ga., 103. 
Savings Bank (Tremont Street), 37. 
Savings Bank founded by, 417. 
Scarlet, Elizal)eth, 206. 
Scarlet Letter, 92 ; description of, 93. 
Scarlett's Wharf, 114 ; description of, 

168. 
Scarlett's Wharf Lane, 168. See Fleet 

Street. 
School Street, 28, 32, 56, 57, 63, 67. 
Schwartzenburg, Prince, 321. 
Scollay's Buildings, 37 ; description 

of, 74 ; history of, 75, 76 ; spinning 

school on site of, 302, 388. 
Scollay, John, 74. 
Scollay, William, 39, 74 ; residence of, 

75 ; improvement of Franklin Street, 

254. 
Scollay Square, 74, 97. 
Sconce. See South Battery. 
Sconce Lane. See Hamilton Street. 
Scoot, Thomas, 206. 
Scott, Madam Dorothy, 124 ; residence 

of, 264 ; dies, 265 ; witnesses battle 

of Lexington, 265 ; anecdotes of, 265. 
Scott, Captain James, 264. 
Scott, General Winfield, presents flag 

to Mexican Volunteers, 379. 
Scotto, Thomas, 58. 
Seafort, sliip, 178. 
Seamen's Bethel founded, 373. 
Sears's Building, 82, 83. Post-Office 

on site of, 104. 
Sears, David, 196 ; residence, 334 ; 

commands Cadets, 337 ; mansion, 

337, 389, 396. 



476 



INDEX. 



Second Baptist Church, location and 
sketch of, 222, 223. 

Second Church (New Brick), 84 ; history 
and location of, 155, 156, 158, 161. 

Seekonk Branch Railroad Company 
located on South Cove, 411, 

Segur, Louis Philippe, Count de, 19 ; 
account of Boston Society in 1782, 
362, 435. 

Selfridge, Thomas 0., kills Austin, 
114. 

Serapis, frigate, 180. 

Sergeant, Peter, builds Province House, 
236, 246. 

Seven Dials, 153. 

Seven Star Inn, See Pleiades. 

Seven Star Lane, Summer Street so- 
called, 387. 

Sever, James, 184. 

Sewall's Elm Pasture, 52. 

Sewall, Jonathan, 273, 364. 

Sewall, Rev. Joseph, 138, 232. 

Sewall, Samuel, 13, 35 ; residence of, 
51 ; marriage, 52 ; presides at witch- 
craft trials, 52, 204, 211, 228, 271 ; 
buried, 296, 362 ; plants trees, 409, 

Sewall Street, 52. 

Seward, Major, 206. 

Shattuck, Lemuel, 365. 

Shaw, Charles, 6, 8, 37, 102, 109. 

Shaw, Chief Justice, 83. 

Shaw, Francis, residence of, 158. 

Shaw, Lemuel, Chief Justice, 283 ; 
usher of Franklin School, 417. 

Shaw, Robert G., residence of, 158. 

Shaw, Major Samuel, residence of, 158 ; 
challenges Lieutenant Wragg, 159, 

Shaw, Williams., 38. 

Shawmut, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 10. 

Shays, Daniel, 103. 

Sliays's Rebellion, 361. 

Shea, Lieutenant, anecdote of, 217. 

Sheaffe, Helen, 65. 

Sheaffe, Mrs., 53 ; residence of, 74, 410. 

Sheaffe, Sir Roger Hale, 97, 154 ; resi- 
dence and sketch of, 410, 411. 

Sheaffe Street supposed residence of 
John Hull, 212. 

Sheaffe, William, 65 ; Deputy Collec- 
toj' in 1770, 97. 



Sheaffe, Margaret, 97. 

Sheaffe, Susanna, 97, 

Shed, Joseph, 282. 

Sheehan's Pond, 329, 

Sheerness, British man-of-war, 332. 

Slielburne, Lord, 398. 

Shelcock, Richard, innkeeper, 112, 

Shepard, Colonel, 275. 

Shepard, Preston, innkeeper, 248. 

Sheppard, John H., 221. 

Sheriff, Captain, 137. 

Shirley, Frances, 32. 

Shirley, Governor William, 28, 29, 30. 
31, 32, 35, 42, 62 ; supersedes Belcher 
102 ; returns from Louisburg, 115 
140, 162, 179, 211, 215, 236 ; resi' 
dence of, 239 ; colonial stamp tax 
239, 240 ; events of his administra 
tion, 240 ; funeral of, 267 ; troops 
for Louisburg, 326 ; gifts to Trinity 
Church, 387. 

Shirley, William, Jr., killed, 240. 

Ship Street (North), 153 ; description 
of, 168. 

Ship Tavern, site and history of, 174, 
175, 178. 

Short, Captain Richard, 210. 

Short Street (Kingston), 45. 

Shubrick, Commodore William B., 186. 

Shurtleff, Nathaniel B., 8, 62. 

Shute, Samuel, 31, 49, 102, 236, 247. 

Shreve, Crump, and Low, 390. 

Shrimpton's Lane, 56, 96. 

Shrimpton, Colonel Samuel, 56. 

Sidewalks in Boston, 22. 

Siege of Boston, 86. 

Sigourney, Lieutenant James, 221. 

Sigourney, Lydia H., 35. 

Simons, Henry, 151, 

Simpson, Daniel, 150, 

Simpson, Isaac, 282. 

Sister Street, 262 ; name changed, 280. 
See Leather Street. 

Sixty-fiftli British Regiment, 32. 

Sixty-fourth British Regiment, 285. 

Skillin, Simeon, 92. 

Slater, Peter, 282. 

Slavery, negro, 13 ; white, 13, 14, 183 

Sloper, Samuel, 282. 

SnelUng, Colonel Josiah, 221. 



INDEX. 



477 



Snow, Caleb H., 133 ; residence of. 158. 

Snow Hill. See Copp's Hill. 

Snow-Hill Street, 195, 204. 

Snow, Rev. \V. T., 67. 

Small, General John, 69, 125, 

Small-pox parties, 389. 

Smibert, John, residence of, 72 ; studio, 

73 ; architect of Faneuil Hall, 135, 

165, 334. 
Smibert, Mary (Williams), 72, 276 ; 

Governor Oliver a patron. 279. 
Smibert, Nathaniel, 72. 
Smith, Abiel, 196. 
Smith, Barney, 230. 
Smith, Captain, 357. 
Smith, Lieutenant-Colonel Francis, 

commands Lexington expedition, 

242, 304. 
Smith, J. V. C, 331. 
Smith, Dr. Oliver, 306. 
Smith, Richard, innkeeper, 112 ; keeps 

Crown Coffee House, 112. 
Smith, Svdney, 129. 
Smith, W. H., 40, 378. 
Society of the Cincinnati, 71 ; met at 

Bunch of Grapes, 105 ; anecdote of, 

367. 
Soissonnais (regiment), 435. 
Somers, Lord, 78. 
Somerset, British frigate, 203, 214, 

217. 
Somerset Club House, 363. 
Somerset Court. See Ashburton 

Place. 
Somerset, Mass. , 52. 
Somerset Place (Allston Street), 363. 
Somerset Street, Webster's house in, 

46 ; named for, 52 ; conveyed to 

town, 52, 363. See Valley Acre. 
Somerset, The, 363 ; house built, 363 ; 

Lafayette lodges in, 363. 
Sons of Liberty, 331 ; Stamp Act re- 
peal, 359, 396, 397, 398. 
Sontag, Madame, 394. 
Southack's Court, 48. 
Southack Street, 370. 
Southack, Cyprian, 48, 49, 302. 
South Allen Street, called Fayette 

Street, 316. See McLean Street. 
South Battery (Rowe's Wharf), 109, 



115, 158, 251 ; blo^vn up, 272 ; de- 
scription of, 284, 327. See Sconce. 

Soutii Berwick, Me., 26. 

South Boston, 23, 25 ; City institu- 
tions, 376. 

South Boston Bridge, 7. 

South Boston Point, 338. 

South Burying-Ground (Washington 
Street), gates of, 96 ; Granary so 
called, 296. 

South Cove, 7, 8 ; improvement, 411. 

South End, 10. 

South Margin Street, 150. 

South Market Street, built, 129, 130. 

South Meeting-house. See Old South, 
228, 229. 

South Mills, 151. 

South Street, 7. 

Souverain, French ship, 437. 

South Writing-School, location and in- 
cident of, 314 ; concealment of can- 
non in, 314. 

Sparhawk, Nathaniel, 384. 

Sparks, Jared, 233. 

Spear, Nathan, 129. 

Spear, Samuel, 349. 

Spear, Thomas, 283. 

Spear's Wharf, 129. 

Spinning-schools, establishment of,302. 

Sprague, Charles, 364 ; impromptu on 
Lafayette's reception, 354 ; home, 
416 ; anecdote of, 417. 

Sprague, Samuel, 283. 

Spring Gate, 234. 

Spring Lane, 10, 39, 109, 234. 

Springs of water, 10, 22. 

Spurr, John, 282. 

Spurzheim, John Gaspard, residence 
of, 275. 

Stackpole House, 254. 

Stackpole, William, 254. 

Stamps of Colonial Stamp Act, 239, 240. 

Stamp Act, celebration of repeal, 358, 
359. 

Staniford Street, 370. 

Stanley, Lord, 204 ; visits Boston, 341, 
367. 

Stark, General John, relics of Ben- 
nington, 346. 

Starr, James, 282. 



478 



INDEX. 



State Bank, 95, 104, 201. 

State House (new), 336, 339 ; built on 
Hancock's Pasture, 339 ; architect 
of, 343 ; styled the " Hub," 344 ; 
history of, 344 ; statue of Webster, 
344 ; of Horace Mann, 345 ; of Gov- 
ernor Andrew, and General Wash- 
ington, 345 ; tablets in, 345 ; Lafay- 
ette's reception in, 345, 346 ; Senate 
Chamber, portraits and revolution- 
ary relics in, 346 ; ancient codfish 
in Representatives' Chamber, 348, 
355 ; faulty proportions of, 370. 

State Street, 26, 41 ; Governor Lever- 
ett's house, 83 ; early settlers in, 88 ; 
celebration of Declaration of Inde- 
pendence, 91 ; Avidened, 101 ; called 
the Broad Street, 101 ; Jeremiah 
Dummer born in, 103 ; retrospective 
view of, 113 ; military displays in, 

113 ; fire of 1711, 113 ; affray in, 

114 ; signs in, 146. 
Statues, public, 344, 345. 
Stavers, Bartholomew, 26. 
Stebbins, Mrs., 407. 
Stebbins, Miss, 345. 

Steele, John, commands North Bat- 
tery, 177 ; ropewalk, 370. 

Stevens, El)enezer, 282, 295. 

Stevenson, Marmaduke, hung, 330. 

Stevenson, Mary, 5. 

Stewart, Cliarles, 186 ; commands Con- 
stitution, 191, 194. 

Stewart, Captain, 62. 

Stewart, T. L., 378. 

Stewart, W., 378. 

Stillman, Rev. Samuel, residence of, 
222 ; buried, 296. 

Stillman Street, named, 222. 

St. Andrew, Holborn, 67. 

St. Andrew's Lodge, 196. 

St. Botolph's Church, Boston, Eng- 
land, 6, 7, 50. 

St. Clair, General Arthur, 221. 

St. Mary Woolnoth, church of, 210. 

St. Paul's, Warren's remains entombed 
in, 69 ; architect of, 310 ; descrip- 
tion of, 311 ; a new era of church 
architecture, 311 ; fourth Episcopal 
church, 311. 



I St. Paul's, London, England, 32. 

St. Vincent, Lord, 407. 

Stocks, location of, 92. 

Stoddard, Mr., 217. 

Stoddard, Mrs., 21. 

Stone, Captain, 15. 

Stone Chapel, 33. See King's Chapel. 

Stone, General Ebenezer W., 147. 

Stone, Emily, 206. 

Stone, innkeeper, 96. 

Storer, Mr., 389. 

Storey. See Pierpont. 

Storrs, Rev. Richard S., 415. 

Story, Joseph, 44, 100 ; anecdote of, 
249 ; opinion of Dexter, 353, 

Stoughton, Governor William, 148. 

Strafford, Earl of, 51. 

Strong, Governor Caleb, sword of, 40 ; 
resides in Province House, 246 ; 
sketch of, 246, 247 ; builds works 
on Noddle's Island, 247 ; personal 
appearance, 247 ; town residence of, 
307, 364. 

Stuart, Gilbert, 38 ; portrait of Knox, 
86 ; of Washington, 141 ; anecdote 
of Talleyrand, 142, 276 ; residence 
of, 407 ; sketch and anecdotes of, 
407, 408. 

Stuart, Jane, 407. 

Sub-Treasury (Exchange), 103. 

Sudbury Lane, 47. ^e Sudbury Street. 

Sudbury Street, 41 ; Governor Eustis 
lives in, 367, 369 ; trees in, 409. 

Sudbury River, 23. 

Sullivan, James, 39, 114, 201 ; tomb 
of, 296 ; residence of, 371 ; sketch 
of, 388, 433. 

Sullivan, General John, 359, 381. 

Sullivan, Richard, anecdote of, 388. 

Sullivan, William, 32, 190, 280, 388. 

Sully, Thomas, 276, 336. 

Summer Street, 46, 201, 227 ; descrip- 
tion and residents of, 381 ; called 
Mylne Street, 381. 

Sumner, Governor Increase, 344 ; por- 
trait of, 346. 

Sumner, General W. H., 243, 346, 
348, 367. 

Sumner Street. See Mount Vernon. 

Sun Court Street, 159, 161, 287. 



INDEX. 



479 



Sun Fire Office in Boston, 107. 

Sun Tavern, General Dearborn's res- 
idence, 106, 2{Sb ; other taverns of 
same name, 2S6. 

Surriage, Agnes (Lady Frankland), 
l&>, lt)3. 

Swan, James, residence of, 283, 313. 

Swast'V, Major, 383. 

Swetlenborg, Baron, 280. 

Swift, General Joseph G., 100. 

Swing Bridge, 127. 

Symnies, Andrew, Jr., 66. 



T. 



T Wharf, 114, 115. 

Tabernacle, Millerite, location, 367 ; 
incidents of, 367, 368 ; changed into 
a theatre and destroyed, 368. 

Talbot, Commodore Isaac, 187, 196. 

Talleyrand, Prince, in Boston, 141 ; 
amour of, 142. 

Talleyrand, Perigord, anecdote of, 435. 

Tarleton, Colonel, 436. 

Taylor, Rev. E. T. (Father), residence 
of, 169. 

Taylor's Insurance Office, 196. 

Tea Party, 72, 115, 120, 148, 149 ; 
meeting, 229, 230, 231, 264 ; route 
of, 271 ; arrival at Gfiffin's Wharf, 
281 ; names of, 282 ; anecdotes of, 
282, 283, 284. 

Tedesco, Fortunata, 368. 

Temple, Sir John, 337, 349. 

Temple, Robert, 215. 

Tenii)le Street, named, 350. 

Territory included in Boston, 14 ; en- 
largement of, 23. 

Thacher, James, 430. 

Thacher, Peter, 39, 123, 155 ; installa- 
tion, 173. 

Thacher, Peter 0., 38 ; office, 402. 

Thaclier, Samuel C, 38. 

Thatcher, Mary, 204. 

Thacher, Rev. Thomas, 227. 

Tha.xter, Adam W., 141. 

Thayer, P^phraim, 182. 

Theatre Alley, 254. See Devonshire 
Street. 



The Great Artillery, See Ancient and 
Honorable Artillery, 137. 

Thirty-eighth British Regiment, 113, 
116 ; arrival of, 170. 

Thomas and Andrews, bookstore of, .391. 

Thomas, Isaiah, 79, 80, 98, 100, 107 ; 
prints Massachusetts Spy, 223 ; 
bookstore, 223, 252 ; anecdote of, 
413, 433. 

Thomas, Mr., body of, exhumed, 216. 

Thompson's Island, incident of pur- 
chase, 431. 

Thorndike's Building, 287. 

Thorndike, Israel, 3b9. 

Thome, Charles R., 259. 

Thornton, J. Wingate, 365. 

Thornton's Shipyard, 181. 

Thorwaldsen, 344. 

Three Doves, 146, 147. 

Three Nuns and a Comb, 146. 

Three Sugar Loaves and Canister, 146. 

Ticknor, George, residence of, 353. 

Ticknor, Mrs., 364. 

Ticonderoga, removal of cannon from, 
86, 87. 

Tileston, John, residence of, 218. 

Tileston Street, 174, 213 ; named, 218. 

Tileston, Thomas, 66. 

Tilley's Wharf, 180. 

Tingey, Conmiodore, 382. 

Tinville, Foufjuier, 436. 

Tippecanoe, battle of, 168. 

Tontine Crescent, 39 ; built, 254 ; de- 
scription of, 255. 

Toplitfs Reading Room, 269. 

Topography of Boston, 7. 

Tout, Elizabeth, 206. 

Tower, Abraham, 222. 

Town Bull, 129. 

ToA\ni Cove, 7, 8, 115, 177. 

Town Dock, 7, 8, 19, 102, 108; de- 
scription of, 126, 127 ; corn market 
at, 141, 152, 389. 

TowTi House, 34 ; (Old State House), 
58, 89 ; Pillory and Stocks in front 
of, 92 ; Post-Office in, 104 ; burnt, 
113 ; massacre, 126, 285, 399, 400. 

Town Pump, location of, 84, 118 ; an 
other in Nortli Stjuare, 159. 

Town Records, 19. 



480 



INDEX. 



Town Watering-Place, 381. 

Townsend, Colonel Penn, 289. 

Transcript, Boston, 267. 

Trask, Isaac, innkeeper, 248. 

Trask, Nabby, 248. 

Traveller Building. See Columbian 
Centinel. 

Traverse Street, "Warren and Eagle 
Theatres in, 378. 

Trefry, Widow, 26. 

Trees, disappearance of, 409 ; planting 
of, by early settlers, 409, 410. 

Tremont House, 289 ; built, and anec- 
dotes of, 290, 291 ; Common extends 
to, 296, 353. 

Tremont Row, 47, 56 ; Choate's office 
in, 82 ; Dr. Lloyd's in, 363. 

Tremont Street, 9, 10, 35, 37, 38, 39, 
41, 47, 48, 49, 63, 65, 68, 70, 72, 75 ; 
Faneuil's house in, 135 ; description 
of, 289 ; Long Acre, 289 ; muster of 
Earl Percy's brigade, 304 ; Mather 
Byles a resident of, 412 ; a part 
called Nassau and Holyoke Street, 
412 ; opened to Roxbury, 412. 

Tremont Temple burnt, 292. 

Tremont Theatre, history of, 291 ; cast 
at opening, 292 ; managers, 292 ; 
description of, 293, 378. 

Triangular Warehouse, 130, 131. 

Trimountain, 6, 17. 

Trinity Church, 30 ; description and 
history of, 386, 387 ; General Wash- 
ington attends, 387, 416. 

Trinity Church, New York, 227. 

Triomphant, French ship, 437. 

Tripoli, 171. 

Trucks, long, 177. 

Truckmen, 177. 

Truman, John, 283. 

Trumbull Gallery (Yale), 73. 

Trumbull, Jonathan, 414. 

Trumbull, Colonel John, 69 ; studio in 
Boston, 73 ; paintings 74, 269, 336 ; 
exploit of, 426. 

Truxton, Commodore Thomas, 182. 

Tucker, Joseph, rebuilds Christ Church 
steeple, 214. 

Tucker, Commodore Samuel, residence 
of, 220 ; exploits, 221. 



Tuckerman, H. T.,home of, 421. 

Tuckerman, Joseph, 38. 

Tudor, Frederick, founds the ice trade, 
304. 

Tudor, Deacon John, 175. 

Tudor, William (Judge), 82, 304. 

Tudor, Madam, 175. 

Tudor, William, Jr., 38 ; originates 
North American Review, 304 ; pro- 
poses a monument on Bunker Hill, 
304. 

Tudor's Buildings, 82. 

Tun and Bacchus, 146. 

Tupper, General Benjamin, exploit on 
Boston Neck, 427. 

Turell, Mr., 123 ; Captain, 161. 

Turner, Robert, innkeeper, 122. 

Tuttle, Charles W., 272. 

Twelfth Congregational Church, 64. 

Twenty-third British Regiment, part 
of, in Lexington expedition, 304. 

Twenty-ninth British Regiment, 89 ; 
quarters, 121, 123 ; at the Massacre, 
126 ; on the Common, 326. 

Twickenham, 145. 

Two Palaverers. See Salutation Tav- 
ern, 176. 

Tyler, Royal, 269. 

Tyler, sculptor of London, England, 32. 

Tjmg, Captain Edward, 179. 

u. 

Uhlans, 436. 

Umbrellas first used in Boston, 116. 

Union Bank, 113. 

Union Church, 148. 

Union College, 262. 

Union Hill, 203. 

Union Street, 10, 126, 130 ; named, 

145 ; widened, 147. 
United States Bank, first location, 

92 ; directors of, 389 ; in 1824, 94 ; 

sketch of, 95 ; second location, 95 ; 

Eagle from old Bank, 95 ; iron gates 

of, 96 ; tliird location, 96, 104, 295. 
United States frigate, 1 81 ; accident to, 

183. 
United States Hotel, located on South 

Cove, 411. 



INDEX. 



481 



Universalist Clim-ch, Scliool Street, 63, 

64. 
University Hall (Cambridge), 370. 
University of Utrecht, 103. 
Upsliall, Nicholas, residence of, 157. 
Urann, Thomas, 282. 
Uring, Captain Nathaniel, account of 

the Neck, 419. 
Urqhart, James, 383. 
Ursidine Convent in Boston, 256. 
Usher, Mr., Andros coniined in house 

of, 285. 

V. 

Valley Acre, situation of, 365, 369, 
Valj)araiso, Essex blockaded in, 171. 
Van Buren, Martin, visits Boston, 139, 

185, 192. 
Vane, Sir Henry, 50 ; executed, 51, 

108, 109, 226. 
Vardy, Luke, keeps Royal Exchange 

Tavern, 96. 
Vassall, Florentine, 31, 32. 
Vassall, John, 55. 
Vassall, Leonard, residence of, 389. 
Vassall, William, 31, 76 ; residence of, 

389. 
Vaudreuil, M. de, 61 ; fleet of, in Bos- 
ton, 437. 
Vaughan, Charles, 39; improves Frank 

lin Streetj 254. 
Vergennes, Count de, 58. 
Vermont, ship-of-the-line, 185. 
Vernon, Admiral Edward (Old Grog), 

110. 
Vernon Street, 375. 
Vidal, Captain, 142. 
Vila, James, innkeeper, 105. 
Vine Street, Iniilt, 376. 
Viomenil, General, 356 ; entry into 

Boston in 1782, 433, 434. 
Virginia, ship-of-tlie-line, 185. 
Vyal, John, innkeeper, 174. 



W. 

Wade, Edward, 26, 

Wadsworth, James, bounty for rats, 
395. 



21 



Wadsworth, Recompense, first master 
of Nortli Latin School, 218. 

Wakefield, Cynis, 124. 

Wales, Prince of, in Boston, 371. 

Walker, Admiral Sir H., 48. 

Walker, Robert, 305. 

Wallach, Mr., 262. 

Wallcut, Mr., 39. 

Waller, Ednumd, 181. 

Walley, Thomas, 196. 

Walnut Street, 334 ; residents of, 337, 
338. 

Waltham Street, sea waU built to, 
420. 

Walter, Arthur M., 38. 

Ward, General Artemas, 69 ; com- 
mands in Boston, 382 ; relieved, 383, 
432. 

Wardell, Jonathan, 25, 70. 

Wards, division into, civil and military, 
21. 

Warren, John C, 38, 61, 247; resi- 
dence of, 297, 311, 376. 

Warren, Dr. John, house, 60. 

Warren, Joseph, birthplace of, 60 ; 
residence of, 68 ; manner of his 
death, 69, 70, 124; portrait, 140, 
148, 149, 176, 203, 211, 214 ; bullet 
Avhich killed him, 218 ; address in 
Old South, 228, 248, 269 ; chaise of, 
274, 283 ; remains placed in Granary 
Ground, 297, 308, 311 ; a student of 
medicine, 363 ; Governor Eustis stud- 
ies with, 366 ; anecdote of, 423. 

Warren Street, Roxbury, 61. 

Warren Theatre, 378. 

Warren, William, 40 ; debut in Boston, 
368. 

Washington Artillery, 288, 

Washington Bank, site of, 404. 

Washington Gardens, old Masonic 
Ten)ple built on site of, 312 ; loca- 
tion of, 312 ; history of, 313. 

Wasliington, George, 31, 38 ; visit of, to 
Boston, 42, 43, 44, 58 ; visits Boston, 
1756, 62, m, 73 ; third visit, 91,124; 
portrait by Stuart, 141, 158; ap- 
proves building six frigates, 181 ; 
first monument to, 216, 220 ; de- 
feated, 244, 266, 279, 285, 310 ; stat- 

EE 



482 



INDEX. 



ues of, 344, 345 ; orders Boston at- 
tacked, 359, 373 ; attends Brattle 
Street and Trinity in 1789, 387 ; 
Stuart's portrait of, 408 ; orders 
levelling of works on Neck, 426 ; 
uniform of, 429 ; arms of, 431 ; en- 
try ii\to Boston, 1776, 432. 

Washington Hall, site of, 430. 

Washington House, site of, 429. 

Washington Hotel. See Hall. 

Washington Market, 426 ; site of, 429. 

Washington, Martha, 38. 

Washington Monument, 278. 

Washington Place, 288 ; Gilbert Stu- 
art's residence in, 407. 

Washington Street, 20, 22, 35 ; (Corn- 
hill, Marlborough, Newbury, Or- 
ange), 102 ; great fire of 1787, 416 ; 
narrowness of, 419 ; named, 420 ; 
extent of, 420. 

Washington Theatre. See Garden, 313. 

Washington Village, 23. 

Wasp, American ship, 280. 

Watch-house on Beacon Hill, 334. 

Water, supply of, 22, 23. 

Water Street, 37 ; bridge at foot of, 
109, 141 ; description of, 234 ; Brit- 
ish barrack in, 234 ; trees in, 409. 

Watertown, 159. 

Webb, John, 173, 174. 

Webb, Mr., leaves legacy for Alms- 
house, 300. 

Webster Buildings, 46. 

Webster, Daniel, 44 ; law office, 44 ; 
school, 45 ; anecdotes of, 45, 46, 47 ; 
first office, 79, 82, 124, 140 ; portrait 
in Faneuil Hall, 140, 150. 279; 
statue of, 344, 353 ; Lafayette visits, 
365 ; anecdotes of, 382 ; receives 
Lafayette, 382 ; defends Powers, 
424. 

Webster, Edward, died, 46, 379. 

Webster, Ezekiel, 45. 

Webster, Fletcher, killed, 46. 

Webster, John White, residence of, 
165 ; execution of, 375, 378. 

Webster, Bedford, residence of, 165. 

Weekly Rehearsal, 234. 

Welsh Fusileers at Bunker Hill; 203, 
229, 285. 



Wells, S. A., 141. 

Wells, William, 38. 

Wellfleet, 49. 

Welsteed, Rev. William, 336. 

Wendell, Jacob, 42, 65, 115. 

Wendell, John, 42. 

Wendell, Oliver, 65, 66 ; residence of, 
279. 

Wentworth, Mrs., 389. 

Wesley, John, 172. 

Wesleyan Association Building, site of 
Indian Qiieen, 248. 

West, Benjamin, 38, 336 ; Stuart a 
pupil of, 408. 

West Church (Lynde Street), 72, 234 ; 
windmill near, 369 ; history of, 374, 
416. 

West Boston, 10 ; windmill at, 199 ; 
Powder House at, 329 ; d'efence 
of, 362 ; description of, 369, 370 ; 
streets of, 370 ; town institutions at, 
374. 

West Boston Bridge, 369. 

West End, 10. 

West Hill, mortar battery on, 325. 

West Newbury, Franklin's press at, 
80. 

West, Raphael, 408. 

West Row, location of, 371. 

West Roxbury, 23. 

West, Rev. Samuel, 415. 

West Street, 10, 93 ; limit of, the Mall, 
306 ; Haymarket in, 313 ; Whipping- 
Post and Pillory near, 313. 

Western Avenue (Mill Dam), 25. 

Westminster Abbey, 32. 

Wetherle, Joshua, appointed mint- 
master, 422. 

Wetmore, Judge, 403. 

Wetmore, William, 389. 

Wlialley, General Edward, 55. 

Wliarton and Bowes, shop of, 85. 

Wheatley, John, 233. 

Wheatley, PhilUs, residence and sketch 
of, 233. 

Wheeler, Benjamin, &Q. 

Wheeler, David, 20. 

Wheeler, Josiah, 282 ; builds Hollis 
Street Church, 415. 

Wheeler, Mr., 322. 



INDEX. 



483 



Wlieeler's Point, 25 ; trees planted on, 

409. 
^\^leel^v^ight's Wliarf, British barracks 

on, 274, 2S4, 358. 
Wliidah (ship), 49. 
Wliig Club, 2(59. 

Whipping-Post, location of, 92, 313. 
Whiston,^Mr., 314, 315. 
AVhite Horse Tavern, site and sketch 

of, 392, 393. 
White, Marcy, 206. 
White Plains, battle of, 87. 
Whitebread Alley. See Harris Street. 
Wliitefield, Rev. George, 64, 102 ; 

preaches on the Common, 358. 
Whiting, William, 74. 
\Miitrnan, Zachariah, 416. 
Wliitmo' '. H., 122. 
Wliitney, coionel, 287. 
Whittington, Richard, 131. 
Whitweil, William, 387. 
Wilder, Marshall P., 365. 
Wildes, Ephraim, innkeeper, 154. 
Wilkes, John, 52, 269, 432. 
Willard, Solomon, architect of United 

States Bank, 94, 310 ; sketch of, 311 ; 

architect of Bunker Hill Monument, 

312 ; discovers Bunker Hill Quarrv, 

312, 337. 
William and Mary, 210. 
William III., charter of, 209, 237. 
Williams College, 120. 
Williams Court, 338. 
Williams John, 170. 
Williams, John, hanged, 424. 
Williams, John D., 420. 
Williams, John Foster, 211 ; died, 

211, 264 ; street named for, 280. 
Williams Market, old fortifications 

near, 424, 425. 
Williams, Major, 203. 
Williams Street named, 280. See Mat- 
thews Street. 
Williamsburg, battle of, 168. 
Willis's Lane. See Winter Street. 
Wilmington, Mass., 26. 
Wilson's Lane, 56 ; description of, 101. 
Wilson, John, 50, 91 ; estate of, 92, 

212. 
Wiltshire Street. See Chambers Street. 



Windmill, old, 199 ; one at West Bos- 
ton, 199. See Windmill Point. 

Windmill Hill. See Copp's Hill. 

Windmill Point, 7 ; (Wheeler's) 25, 
381. 

Wing's Lane (Elm Street), 102, 126, 
145. 

Winnisimmet, 14, 24 ; ferry, 68. 

Winslow, Governor Edward, 40 ; his 
chair, 347. 

Winslow Blues, 137, 190. 

Winslow, John, recognizes Warren's 
body, 69 ; store and residence of, 
87. 

Winter Hill, 203. 

Winter Place, Samuel Adams's house 
in, 308. 

Winter Street, noted residents, 307 ; 
Mrs. Dexter' s, 307 ; Samuel Adams's, 
308 ; called Blott's, Bannister's, and 
Willis's Lane, 308. 

Winthrop House, site, 318 ; burnt, 
318. 

Winthrop, John, 2, 3, 4, 9, 10, 11 ; 
chosen selectman, 14, 19, 25 ; burial- 
place, 35 ; portrait, 40, 47, 50, 51 ; 
Anne Hutchinson on trial, 63 ; at- 
tends First Cliurch, 91 ; invites Lord 
Ley to his house, 109 ; journal, 130 ; 
orders ship built at Medford, 178 ; 
company, 202 ; residence, 225 ; house 
destroyed by British, 225 ; sketch 
of, 225 ; death, 225 ; statue of, 226- 
234 ; portraits of, 346, 347 

Winthrop, Judge, 39. 

Winthrop's Marsh, 109. 

Winthrop Place, 364. 

Winthrop, Robert C, 57 ; birthplace, 
254 ; residence of, 337 ; proposes 
Fi-anklin statue, 337, 352. 

Winthrop, sloop, 186. 

Winthrop, Lieutenant-Govenior Thom- 
as L., 139, 190 ; residence of, 337 ; 
Lafavette visits, 364 

Wirt, William, 82. 

Woburn, 86. 

Wood, original gro\\'th of, 10. 

Wood, William, 6, 16. 

Woodbridge, Benjamin, 96, 332. 

Woodbury, Levi,"l39, 185. 



484 



INDEX. 



Woodmansie's Wharf, 127. 
Worcester Spy. See Massachusetts 

Spy. 

Wolfe, General, proposed monument 

to, 241, 244, 326, 327. 
Workhouse in Park Street, 203, 299, 

300 ; occupied by wounded, 300, 

359. 
Wortley, Lord, visits Boston, 341. 
Wragg, Lieutenant, quarters of, 158. 
Wren, Sir Christopher, epitaph, 76, 

369. 
Wright, Colonel Isaac Hull, 379. 



Wyeth, Mr.,2S3. 

Wyre, Robert, residence of, 171. 



Yale College, 72. 

Yale, Governor Elihu, 73 ; epitaph, 73. 
York (Toronto), Royal Standard cap- 
tured at, 106. 
YorktoA\m, Va., 103. 
Young, A. B.,113. 
Young, Dr. John, 176, 269. 
Young, Thomas, 282. 






THE END, 



^1. 



^ 928 



(i> 



